CBM 8-Bit Magazine Index: Commodore World

ORL

ie NEWS MAGAZINE FOR COMMODORE 64'& 128 USERS

Move your, Commodore Into
he fast lane.on todays
gnformation Supe gue a

Easy Fixes”

Or the repair shop

SCSI Magic

Find out what YOu'cany realli)
‘do with SGSi peripherals), i

SmartMouse

few packs new features into

a smooth operator
ay ft f AS.

in Review: I Paint & I Port
M Mini-Views:64 Games
@BIG.GUNS. gets. ‘spaced’
BRelovating, common code
B.Wiiting” a GEOS ‘program
a ‘BBS Spotlight; ¢ OMNI 128

ers fe Rihiiils af

Bhings to iy) before, your head]

o Mm Mm Ae) D 0 R di tee

550 Canad eae,

=

Thousands of Commodore Owners Choose Us
As Their One Stop Supplier . Here's Why!

* Largest Selection of Commodore Software in the U.S.A.!
After seven years in business, nobody in the Commodore
market is more committed to your Commodore than we are.
We have well over 200,000 pieces of hard to get software in
stock to service your every need. If you've heard of a product,
odds are that we can locate it for you. And, we stock most
major Commodore titles that are still in production.

>%* Hardware & Peripherals.
Although we can't get keyboards and disk drives any longer,
we can offer disks, modems, cables, interfaces, and much
more.

> Un-Advertised Specials.
Our regular customers enjoy VIP service and great bargains
that are hard to pass up.

> Expert Technical Support.
As a regular Software Support customer, you have access to
the most knowledgeable Commodore technical departments
in the country. Of this, we're darn proud.

%* Friendly & Courteous Order Takers.
You'll havea hard time finding order takers as anxious to help
you as Sandy, Mike, Katy, and Dyann.

Fast Order Processing.
Thanks to our automated computer system, huge inventory
and efficient shipping staff, most orders are processed the
same day.

Walk In Sales Department.
We welcome visitors to our warehouse outlet. The same great
deals are available and best of all, no shipping charges.

Worldwide Distributor Of Major Products.
Ever hear of Maverick, Super Snapshot, Super 1750 Clone,
and the 1581 Toolkit? We've been actively involved in the
ground up production and world-wide distribution of these
and many other fine Commodore products.

%* Purchase From Us With Confidence.
We were very pleased when the Better Business Bureau came
to us and told us that our outstanding reputation qualified us
as members in their organization. We're here tostay, nota fly
by night, here today and gone tomorrow outfit.

Extensive Catalog.

Our contacts at other mail
order companies have told
us that producing a catalog,
such as ours is too time
consuming and worst of all
- too expensive. We say it's
the least we can do for our
customers, and wouldn't
have itany other way.Sim-
ply call or write for your
free copy.

1993 q

SOFTWARE SUPPORT
INTERNATIONAL

Check Out These Examples...

GAMES,
Leaderboard Golf.
Castle Wolfenstien Bund!
Nord & Bert..
Zork 1-2-3 Bundle
Trump Castle Casin
Bureaucracy 128...
Defender of the Crown
Beyond Zork 128
Three Stooges
Honeymooners
Adventure Creator
Wheel Fortune 1-2-3 Bundle

EDUCATIONAL,
Dinosaurs .
Stickybear Math
European Nations & Locations
Typing Tutor 4
Word Attack
Reader Rabbit
Sky Travel...
Lovejoy Prep For SAT.
Word Spinner...

PRODUCTIVITY
Super 1750 Clone
Newsroom...
Certificate Maker
Geos 64 v2..
Fast Load Cart
Paperclip II] 64/128
Printmaster Plus.
Superbase 64 or 128
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Postcards ....
Outrageous Pages
Bob’s Term Pro 64....

Items Listed Above Do Not Include Shipping. Call Or Write For Your Free
Catalog Listing Hundreds Of Products And Special Offers For Your
Computer. Our Order Takers Are On Duty 6:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.
M - Fand 7:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m, Sat. - Pacific ‘Time.

Software Support Int.
SOFTWARE sot»

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Suite A-10
Vancouver, Wa 98661
(206) 695-1393

CALL TOLL FREE TODAY! 1-800-3 56-1 1 79

Major Credit Cards Accepted.

C O N T N T

ISSUE 2

VOLUME 1 . NUMBER 2 . dune 6, 1994

COMMODOR Features

18 Commopore TRIVIA by Jim Brain
How well do you know your Commodore facts?

19 Speciat Report: COMMODORE IN LIQUIDATION py Tim Walsh
Get up-to-date on this unfolding Commodore story

SAR REN RN aR een err 22. INTERNET: ToDaAY’s INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAY? by Craig Taylor
A look at the Internet and the upcoming information revolution

26 Harp Tips by Mark Fellows
Some things to try when your computer starts acting illogical
Genera MaNaGer

Charles R. Christianson Reviews
° 30 | PAINT by Sherry Freedline
Eptor Our staff reviewer checks out this powerful C-128 Interlaced drawing program
Doug Cotton 31. | Port by Sherry Freedline
° Find out all about this C-128 graphics conversion utility
eres pl 32 SmartMouse by Steve Vander Ark
Ghee A first look at the new input device from CMD
fia be : 33 MINIVIEWS by Sherry Freedline
Plog a a Our new mini-review section with a look at some C-64 games
Charles A, Christianson
413-525-0023 CoLumNns
°
GusgeAes 16 Just For STARTERS by Steve Vander Ark
: Why our computers don’t always understand us
Doug Cotton
20 Foreicn EXCHANGE by Joseph Gaudl
Quick peeks at a couple of European programs for RAMLink users
34 GRAPHIC INTERPRETATION by Steve Vander Ark
Guid Steve gets sidetracked on his way to writing this issue's column on C
IN THE COVER
36 GEOPROGRANMMIST by Maurice Randall

Maurice Randall's

ARCA Chrysler LeBaron Coupe. Create your first GEOS program

38 Basic INSTINCTS by Gene Barker
Last issue’s BIG GUNS becomes the new STARSHIP CONQUEST

Commodore Wotld s oho way allied wih Commodore 44 ADVANCED TECHNIQUES by Doug Cotton

Businoss Machines, Inc. Commodore World is published bi- Applying relocatable machine language to create ‘common code’ 64/128 programs
quarterly by Creative Micro Designs, Inc., 15 Benton Drive, 46 V .

East Longmeadow MA 01028-0646. Second-Ciass Postage - oC

Palé at East Longmeadow MA. Application to mall at PERIPHERAL VISION by Doug Cotton

‘Second-Class postage rates is pending at East Longmeadow, An introduction to SCSI devices and commands

MA. Annual subscription rate is US$29.95 for U.S. addresses, 50

US$35.95 for Canadian addresses. All subscription payments Carrier DETECT dy Les Songa
must be provided in U.S. Dollars. Mail subscriptions to CW ti *

BEAM oe Grtivbacre Derioainere Orpareey Commodore Guru Jim Butterfield makes a guest appearance on GEnie

Ei Mi a
iilacipictiiccacaibiaia 54 Over THe EDGE py Charles A. Christianson

What Commodore's liquidation means to 8-bit users

Entire contents copyright © 1994 by: itive Micro:
Designs, Inc. No part of this publication may be printed or
Senin att eee oe | DEPARTHENTS
Seagiediadenly mercy rope

Micro Designs, inc.. assumos no responsiblity for errors or 2 Fron tHe Eorror 12 User Group Connection See Our New
‘omissions in editorial, program listings or advertising content. 4 Backauk 14 Top Ties

Creative Micro Designs, Inc., does not assume any liability for CHK-LIST
advertisers’ claims, 6 dust Asking 51 On-une News Niestes

POSTMASTER: Sond address changos to CW Address 5 On The Hopzon 52 BBS Sronicnt Ueillty,
‘Changes, c/o Creative Micro Designs, Inc., P.O, Box 646, East 10 THe CONNECTION 56 Aoverriser’s INvEx On Page 49

Longmeadow MA 01028-0646.

From THE EpITor..:

Seems like a lot has happened since Issue 1 of Commodore World headed out the door just a few
short weeks ago, About a week later, on April 29th, Commodore announced their plans to
liquidate, We had already been watching the situation at Commodore closely, and had planned to
bring you any updates, With this news, however, we decided we should expand on those plans, so
you'll see quite a bit about this turn of events as you read this current issue, Tim Walsh covers a bit
of this territory in SPECIAL REPORT; you'll find some of the press releases that have been floating
around about this in ON THE HORIZON, Jeff Jones mulls it over in the LoadStar section of THE
CONNECTION; and Charles Christianson give Commodore a little flogging in OVER THE
EDGE. Quite a bit of attention, but it’s obviously an important topic.

You'll no doubt notice that this issue has a few more pages than the last; we've added a couple of
feature articles to the mix this time around, We've also expanded our IN REVIEW section, and
added a MINIVIEWS for some smaller reviews, With all the additional review space, we needed to
get someone on-board to help handle these; we're happy to announce that much of this will fall into
the lap of Sherry Freedline. Sherry has a lot of experience with Commodore programs since she
handles most of the file librarian chores on GEnie, and we're happy to welcome her to our pages.

We also welcome another new regular to our pages this month; Les Songa has taken over the
CARRIER DETECT area, and has converted that into a column, ON-LINE NEWS NIBBLES,
another new department handled by will bring you those little news tidbits that were previously

Jound in CARRIER D. T. BBS SPOTLIGHT, which will continue to grace our pages, is now
considered to be a separate department.

Another reason for adding some pages to this issue is Gene Barker's BASIC INSTINCTS. Gene
started things out real simple l we with BIG GUNS, but has stepped up the pace considerably
with STARSHIP CONQU! is a game that Gene will continue to expand on over the next

Jew issues, and if the first installment is any indication, we're in for a BIG one! To help everyone
avoid all those typing errors that pop up when entering programs, we've created CHK-LIST, Don't
enter without it!

Finally, you'll notice some other changes this issue—new paper, new printing process, second
class mailing; we're experimenting, and trying to do what we can to continue to bring you the best
in information on the Commodore computing front. Be sure to write us, and let us know what you
like and dislike (so far we haven't heard much in the latter category, as you'll note in our new
BACKTALK section). We're always looking for better ways to do things—afier all, we're
Commodore users!

aoe

Doug Cotton
Commodore World Editor

Volume 1, Number 2 2 Commodore World

Info 215-586-5701
FAX 215-586-5706

oftware Hut

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‘Ardok the Barbarian 6,00
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Deja Vu 9,00
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Felony! 9,00
Gateway to the Savago Frontier 14,00
lack Attack carteidge 5.00
Jeopardy 1, 2, uf, Sports (Specify) 10,00
Learning Bridge Made Easy 9.00
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Navy Seals 12.95
PathWords 9.00
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Rambo 2 6.00
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Secrets of the Silver Blades 14.00
‘Shoot'em Up Construction Kit 12.00
Silent Service 10.00
Swiss Family Robinson 10.00
Tass Times in Tone Town 9.00
Test Pilot Bundle (ATF. Crazy Cars,

Tomahawk, Harrier, Inftrator 2) "15.00
Tetris 13.00
Three Stooges: 12.95,
Tony LaRussa Baseball 12.00
Tony LaRussa Teams (Specity) 7.00
Weird Dreams 11.00

Wheel of Fortune 1,2,Gold,Jr (Specity) 10.00

Where (Specity) is Carmen §,0.2 27.00
Who Framed Roger Rabbit 22.00
World Games 12.00
Wrath of the Demon 22.00

PERIPHERALS &

ACCESSORIES

1764 RAM Exp. - Adds 256K to C64 or

64C, w/Heavy Duty Power Supply =
$69.95

1700 RAM Expansion - Adds 128K to

6128 or 1280 - $49.95

1670 Modem - Now, unboxed -$17.95

1670 Modem - Now, boxed with all parts
$29.95

Micro R&D Printor Intertaca - For non
CBM paralle! printers, supports graphics
$49.95

1200 Commodore Printer - Complete
with all Cabling and Manual. 120cps.
Supports Graphics. Ready to use =
$129.95

1950 Mouse - New, unboxed -$29.95

5 oF 8 pin Composite Cable $8.95
C128 to Magnavow/1084 (Specity) 14.95
Computer/Disk Drive Cable - 6M, 12.95
Disk Notcher 495
Surge Protector wEMI (6 Outlet ) 14,00
10845 Monitor Call

Call for Printer Ribbons

Volume 1, Number 2

UPGRADING?
AMIGA 500
Special

Refurbished by Commodore

+ Like-now condition, 90 Oay Warranty

* Great for Boglnners

+ Mouse & Power Supply additional
One A500 for $125.00

Two or more for $115.00 each

Bundled Options
Purchase an Amiga 500 computer
& you may buy the following
bundled options at these special
reduced prices.

‘A500 User Man WB 1.3 Enhancer$10.00

A500 Power Supply & Mouse 39.00
S01 512K RAM 29.00
4520 Video Adapter 25.00
AlfaData External Floppy Orive 79.95
1084S Monitor 239.00
Discovery Bundle: KindWords,

OPaint 2, Ports of Call 11.00

Starter Bundle: KinaWords

Fusion Paint, F-18, F-40,

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Productivity
Big Blue Reader 4 35,00
Data Manager 2 (64) 22.95
ome Home Accounting 64.95
GEOS 64 v2.0 42.95,
GEOS 128 v2.0 45.00

Geo File 64 of Geo Cale 64 (Specity) 45.00
Geo File 126 or Geo Cale 128 (Specity)52.95

Geo Programmer Call
Geo Publish 64 4500
Master Type 8,00
Merlin 128 45.00
News Maker 128 10.00
Printshop 36.95
SwittCale (64) 22.95
Super 81 Utities 64-128 (Specity) 14.00
Superdase 64 v3.01 26.95
WoraWrter 6 3495

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Is your C64 or 64C broken?

Can't find any place to repair it? We
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PARTS & JOYS

+ 64 Power Supply - $22.95
+ 64 or 64C Keyboard (Specity) - $19.00
+ 01280 Keyboard + $22.00

+ C1280 Int. P. Supply - $38.00

+6128 Ext, P. Supply Refurb - $34.00

+P. S, for 1541-2 1571-2 1581- $26.00
+ Micro R&O C64 Rep‘able P.S. - $36.95,
+0128 Motherboard - $95.00

+ 01280 Motherboard - $99.95

Bollistck ot Navigator (Specity) $20.00

The Bug 23.00
Competition Pro 5000 21.00
Ergo Stick 1800
Hyper Star Joystick 2400
Kraft Triple Trackball 4000
Maverick 1 or Tac 3 (Specity) 14.00
Python t or Apache 1 (Specity) 13.00
‘Slik Stik 9.00
‘Speed King Turbotire 2200
‘Super Pro Zip Stick 21.00

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OUR POLICIES

‘No waiting for your orders to ship
Orders in by 2PM go out the same day.
Second Day & Overnight shipping 1s
available. International orders are
Shipped by Air Parcel Post, UPS or DHL.
Domestic orders are shipped UPS.
+All orders ara subject to credit card
vealfication +
+ All prices subject o change *

Cs

Supplies are limited and on a first-come
Hist-serve basis, We accept Visa, Master
Card, and Discover, We also ship COD,
accepting Cash, Certified Check, of
Money Order, Software and accessories
Shipping is $6.00. Hardware shipping is
$6,00 for small items. Call for larger
items (ie. Computers). COD ad $5.00.
Minimum GOD order is $50.00, Canadian,
‘APO, & International orders are welcome,
We will Bil only for actual shipping
charges & insurance at time of order
15% re-stocking fee on all returns not
exchanged. Shipping is NOT relundable,

(© Copyrant 1954, lechwWiters Ine. Al Rghis Reserved

Commodore World

G@ACKTALK

COMMODORE WORLD READERS SHARE THEIR THOUGHTS

What a terrific effort! This promises to be a
landmark publication for the Commodore
computerist, Ihavebeen Commodore computing
for only a few years and have seen several
ions devoted to this platform come and
Long life to Commodore World.

~ Edward Rohan, Anaheim, CA

son your new Commodore World
Magazine. Like the majority of us 1 had a
subscription to RUN magazine for years and was
quite upset at it’s demise. (The publisher still
doesn’t understand why I do not want to renew
the PC World subscription he has been sending
me asa substitute.)

- Benjamin Dorsey, Tequesta, FL

Just received my premier issue of Commodore
World. Congratulations for a top-notch
publ

ion; [ook forward to following issues.
- A. Herbig, Derwaod, MD

Justanotetosay thankyou forthenew magazine...
Ireceived the first issue of Commodore World and
was very impressed, The articles were very
interesting and they were easy enough for those
ofus who aren't familiar with computer terms to
understand, 1am excited now because | know
there are others out there who still have a
Commodore, | know there is hardware and
software available, and more importantly know
how to get my

ds on it,
+ Darla Smith

WOWIIt's beautifull [just received my first copy
of Commodore World....!HANK YOU, THANK
YOU, THANK YOU!

- John Marcelle, Manteca, CA

Just read your Premier issue and wanted to let
you know what I thought about it. At first, I
thoughtitlooked rather thin, butafter completing
it, Iwasrather pleased. [feel that you compliment
dieHard very well and found everything to be
What J am looking for. Excellent!

- Dan Koleski, Pres. L.U.C.K.Y.

Volume 1, Number 2

I just got Commodore World today - folks - 1 do
think we havea WINNER! Saw a number of neat
articles by authors I have read & enjoyed. I really
think CMD took a really astronomical chance
with this venture - But I really think that these
guys have really got a feel - For where IT IS!

- Ron Boissoneault, CBM Conferen lonet

Vid

Ijust got the premier issue of Commodore World
magazine from CMD, and [it had] a VERY nice
review of QWKRR 128 V4.2 in it... VERY
well-done magazine by the way, but what ELSE
would we expect from CMD?

‘The magazineis high quality... and hasarticles
of interest for everyone from beginners to the
“pocket protector” crowd. | particularly like the
feeling of camaraderie when referring to the
“competition”. I personally feel the competition
ishealthy, andI'mglad NOT toseeany attitude of
bashing the competition, but an attitude of
cooperation, Each of the several publicationshave
their niche in the market, and there should be
room for everybody.

From the review of coming issues, I can hardly
wait forthe NEXT copy, which promisesa tutorial
on using SCSI commands with the HD.

I would certainly encourage everyone here to
subscribe so we can continue to see the
support CMD has and is providing. I'ma bit o}
skeptic also on new publications, but after seeing
this issue, | immediately called and subscribed,
Bytheway, Commodore Country only got 6issues,
and they were gone in minutes!

- Phil Heberer, CBM Conference, Fidonet

Ijust got my copy of Commodore World yesterday.
I'vejustabout read itall, anditis very nicely done.
I think the biggest thing that surprised me, and
pleased me the most, was the number of
advertisers, That used to be the thing I enjoyed
most about the old Commodore magazines.

It is a very professional looking publication,
though I would have expected no less from CMD.
The article on printers and interfaces w:
extremely useful. I wish I had that kind of
information when I started buying printers,

I'venever been one to recommend subscribing
zine just to make sure it stay
business. Lalways felt any product should be able
todevelop its critical mass based on the qua
its product or service. | think this one is going to
do just that, based on the promise of the premier
and the people already writing for them.
This oneisa must-have, Ifyou haven’tsubscribed
already, you are definitely missing out.

1 personally hope that they evolve into
something more along the lines ofthe Transactor.
At this stage of the game, there are a lot more
experienced users now than new users... and T
miss the TI Nice work... | really am expecting big
things from you all at CMD!

- Ed Bell, CBM Conference, Fidonet

to a mia

I got my issue of Commodore World last week and
have already read it cover to cover twice. I think
it’s going bea great mag, The reviews and articles
were excellent, Since I'ma CMD user (RAMLink
and SwifiLink) it's great to see articles covering
these subjects. [ hope that you will cover CM's
product line in depth with hints and advanced
uses for them. I would especially like articles
along the line of the old Transactor magazines.
Short routines and programs that [can adapt to
usein my own programs. Keep up the good work.

~ Charles Lawson, Commodore RT, GEnie

At long last, | do believe us people out west are
finally getting our Commodore World magazines.
I got mine today and leafed through it and was
VERY, VERY impressed, And I haven'teven read
it yet! Once again, Kudos goes to the people at
CMD. Youwill have my support for as long as my
Commodore is alive.

Iknow that most of the8-bitters left are getting
onin years (heck, in my user's group am the 2nd

youngest at 29), lam doing my best to let some of

4/128 world
is still active, productive, entertaining, as well as
affordable. With CMD coming up with new
products and excellent support, it is helping us
revitalize a dying group.

~ , McKinney, Commodore RT, GEnie

the younger guys know that the C

Commodore World

Wire-walking
AN commodore Star!!
repre

onty
pos avs atic

Steppin’ Out! sas

stig mnt

Chicago, Los Angeles,
New York, or Boston?!?

The Future Has Arrived!!!

ca Tips on all major
commodore software and
hardware like GEOS, Super
Snapshot, Laser Printing,

eax Our annual public domain
issue reviews the available
software in the public
domain and passes the best

dieHard

the Flyer for commodore 8bitters

The perfect way to stay connected
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Subscribe today!

Each issue of dieHard comes packed with information to
make your commodore work better for you and help
keep you connected to other commodore dieHards
Here's what you'll get with your subscription to dieHard:

cx Type-in programs and
more type-in programs!

es Information on

Fleet System, and more! on to you! *telecommunicating
*music on your commodore
va Programming tutorials — ex Our annual Rarities issue «printing
Our Basic BASIC column is lists all sources of *memory management
introducing many readers commodore equipment so AND MORE!!!

for the first time to BASIC
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Volume 1, Number 2

5 Commodore World

Just ASKING

THE COMMODORE WORLD STAFF LOOKS FOR ANSWERS TO USERS’ QUESTIONS

The CMD Hard Drive is great. No
more thousands of disks stacked around my
computer. However, I find myselfintimidated by
‘multimedia’ upgrades and 16 bit sound cards. Is
there any hope for Commodore sound and
multimedia capabilities in the future.

- Don Bostic, Dallas, TX

Let's not lose sight of the fact that

not too long ago, the C-64 was considered to be
on the cutting edge of sound and graphics, Its
capabilitiesasa 8 bit computer canstillamaze 16-
and 32-bit computer users. Although there are
no true multimedia type applications at this point,
much of the necessary hardware technology
already exists. What isrequired for ‘multimedia’?
Mass-storage, lots of RAM, stereo sound and
high quality video all of which are available at the
current time. All that is needed is software which
se hardware devices properly and
multimedia could come to the C-64 and C-128.
Now, I can't predict what is going to be released

in the future but I would not be surprised to see
some multimedia software.

Which is the bigger strain on my
128-D; leaving it on all the time (except monitor
and drives) or turning it on and off several times
a day? Also, if | only use my 1750 REU to store a
dictionary and occasionally other purposes not
requiring more than 512K, is there an advantage
in having a 1 or 2 MB REU? Why are RAM units
like GEORAM and BBGRAM limited to GEO:

= RB., San Jose, CA

The most strain that is put on
electronicdevicesis during the powerupsequence
when the surge of current begins to flow through
the components. Once powered up, components
stabilize and operate effortlessly. The only

exception to this is if environmental conditions
are unfavorable. Favorable operating conditions

Volume 1, Number 2

for modern electronics parallel the comfort zone
for most people; temperatures between 40 and
75 degrees Fahrenheit are most favorable and air
quality should be good to excellent which meat
that there is minimal dust and smoke. Therefo:
if environmental conditions are favorable, it is

better to leave the device on rather than turning
it on and off frequently.
Ifyourapplicationsonly require5 12K ofRAM,
there would be no benefit to having additional
capacity. Besides, there are very few programs

that can use an expanded Ri

It is not possible nor is it practical to link
REU’s. All of the 17xx series RE
registers occupy the same memory locations.
n them together, there will
omputer sends the same

control

Therefore, if
bea conflict when the
commands to both RE the same time.

RAM Expansion units such as GEORAM and
BBGRAMarelimited because of the fact that they
do not have a Direct Memory Access Controller
(DMA Controller). The DMA controller is a
custom chip that Commodore developed to
enhance the speed of 17xx REU’s by performing
memory transfers in hardware between the REU
and the computer. The DMA controller has a
specific set of commands w ized by
software to control the REU. Conversely,
GEORAM and BBGRAM do not have a DMA
controller which means that software must be
written differently so that all memory t
between the computer and RAM expansion are
processed by the computer instead of internally
within the REU. The end result is that access toa
17xx REU is approximately 20 times faster than
that ofa GEORAM.

sfe

. My problem is
that] have to shut down whenever the TV comes
onas the C-64 causes herring bone linesin the TV
picture. [havetried several 'Mickey Mouse filters
and nothing seems to work. Do you have any
suggestions that I could try?
- Doug Blanchard, Grapeview, WA
Unfortunately, RF interference has
longbeenaweaknessfor Commodore equipment.
Before you assume that it is the computer itself,
you should disconnect everything from it—
making sure that all other peripherals are turned
off. Then, systematically begin adding back one
peripheralatatime until theinterferenceappears.
Once the interference appears, try switching the
connecting cables (i.e. ifits the disk drive, try a
new serial cable; monitor, new monitor cable
etc.) If that does not work, try plugging in all of
the power supplies for you computer equipment
into a different wall outlet (Make sure that the
new outlet is not part of the same circuit as the
TV.). Sometimes, the electrical wiring itself can
a giant antenna and by plugging in your
system into a different electrical circuit you can
route the interference away from the affected
device, which in your case is the TV.

Ifnone of these suggestions work, you should
open up the device that is causing the interference
and inspect the interference shields that cover
the board(s). These shields are usually screwed or
soldered to the board. It is important that these
shields be securely attached to the board and
making good contactin order to effectively absorb
the RF signals. And, ifall else fails, try cable TV; it
is not usually effected by RF noise.

act

How can | verify which partition I'm
in on HD, FD, and RL units via software? Is an
annotated listing of BASIC-8 code available? Has
anyone come out with a compiler that compiles
BASIC-8 commands in addition to BASIC-7.0?

- Ben Dorsey, Tequesta, FL.

Commodore World

Verifying your current partition on
4 CMD device is quite simple. You should try
using the Get Partition Info (G-P) command
which is covered in detail on pages: 71 in the
RAMLink manual, 9-15 in the Hard Drive manual
and page 45 in the FD-2000/4000 manual.

As for BASIC-8, I have not had much luck.
Current information on this product is sketchy at
best, soifthereare readers out there that can shed
some light on BASIC-8 related questions, we're
all ears. However, I am quite sure that an
annotated listing of source code was never
released. Companies with commercial soft
rel
software. While researching the answers for this
question, I ran across someone who recalled
speaking to Lou Wallace about BASIC-8
compatibility with the Abacus C-128 compiler—
although we were unsure if such a version was
ever released. We will continue to investigate
BASIC-8 and will print our findings. Once again,
ifyou know something about BASIC-8 please let
us know.

lease documented source code for their

What softwaredoyouuseto produce

Commodore World?
+ Darla Smith

At the risk of being buried in mail, I
am going to answer your question truthfully,

Commodore Worlds produced on a Macintosh
Quadra 650 with 16 MB RAM, Internal 500 MB
drive, external 245 MB drive and CDROM; Mac
Iwith5 MBRAM, internal 245 MB drive, external

Backup, Microtek Scanmaker |
color scanner; and an Apple LaserWriter Select
360. Weusea variety of software packages: Aldus
PageMaker 4.2, 5.0; Microsoft Word 5.0; Adobe
Photoshop2.51, AldusFreehand 4.0, Adobe Type
Manager, and Broderbund Typestyler.
Although we believe that it is possible to
produce a professional looking publication on
the Commodore, we do not feel that we could
produce this type of publication in a timely
manner and maintain our current obligations

and commitments to CMD. Therefore, we have
decided to use the Macintosh system, as did our
predecessors with RUN, to help us produce the

agazine and continue our unparalleled support
64 and C-128 computer,

JUST ASK!

If you're having trouble getting your
system to do what you want it to, or
think you've got something wrong with
your hardware, Just Asking may be
able to help find a solution, or get you
pointed in the right direction. Send
your questions to:

CW Just Asking

c/o Creative Micro Designs, Inc.
P.O. Box 646

East Longmeadow, MA 01028-0646

Please try to keep your questions short
and to the point. Doing so will increase
your chances of being published.

WHO WE ARE
Glen Doty/Phoenix1 - Chief Engineer

OUR GOAL

Kat Tate/Mystique - Dir. Online Operations

George Tate/BigBird - Operations Mgr

', The Phoenix Network :

Rising Up From the Ashes

“Providing Online Computer Entertainment and Services To The Nation

WHAT WE OFFER
* $4.50/hour No monthly fee
(Non-Primetime rates 6pm-7am)
+ Visa & Mastercard Accepted
* Separate Adult & Family Areas

To provide a place where ALL computer
users can meetin acongenial atmosphere,
play games, share information, and gener-
ally have fun.
OUR POLICY
So long as we have a single user of ANY
type of computer online, we will provide
that user with all the support and informa-
tion that we possibly can!
The Phoenix Network
P.O. Box 30757
Flagstaff, AZ 86003-0757
800-869-1155 Voice
800-869-1168 Fax

Positive Proof of age required

* FREE Internet Access

* Shareware/Freeware Libraries for:
Commodore, Amiga, PC, Mac

* BEST Live Action Trivia Games Around

* Over 100 Special Interest Forum Areas

* Ask about creating a Forum Area for your
own group!

* A 24 hour staff that will LISTEN to your
suggestions and try to help you.

* Some of the Best & Brightest members of
Q-Link! Maybe even someone you know:

Sholom Cicada Snickers/CatsO
KellyM&8. = DC Star —_Kcorb . i Hei et = type: D1
MsOgeny She Elf Sir Fitz . fe . aw ype
Mystique Lt Worf Juliad REBIRD

Plus many many more! Join us! Meet some
old friends and make new ones too!

HOW TO JOIN

The Phoenix Network can be ac-

cessed through your local Sprint/

Telenet phone number. If you are

unfamiliar with Sprint, call us toll-

free for full sign-on instructions:
1-800-869-1155

If you are familiar with Sprint

access, do the following:

1. Have your credit card ready
Full access is not granted
Unless you provide credit info.

2. At the CONNECT type in the
following depending on your
baud rate:

300/1200: <return> D <return>
2400 baud: @D <return>

5. Follow sign-on instructions
for access to The Phoenix. yy

Volume 1, Number 2

Commodore World

mY THE RT

COMMODORE

Commodore Announces Liquidation
After the close of business on Friday, April 29, 1994, Commodore made an
announcement. Here are the stories as received from around the globe:

COMMODORE INTERNATIONAL LIMITED TO
LIQUIDATE

NEW YORK, April29 /PRNewswire/—Commodore International Limited
(NYSE: CBU) announced today that its Board Of Directors has authorized
the transfer of its assets to trustees for the benefit of its creditors and has
placed its major subsidiary, Commodore Electronics Limited, into voluntary
liquidation, This is the initial phase of an orderly liquidation of both
companies, which are incorporated in the Bahamas, by the Bahamas
Supreme Court.

CONTACT: Hock Tan, CFO of Commodore International Limited,
215-431-9160

COMMODORE FOLDS
By DINAH WISENBERG BRIN Associated Press Writer
WEST CHESTER, PA. (AP) Commodore International Ltd.,a pioneer in
the personal computer industry, said late Friday it is going out of business.
The company plans to transfer its assets to unidentified trustees “for the

benefit of its creditors” and has placed its major subsidiary, Commodore
Electronics Ltd., into voluntary liquidation.

“This is the initial phase of an orderly voluntary liqui
companies,” Commodore said in a brief statement.

Company executives could not immediately be reached Friday evening.

The company last month reported an $8.2 million loss for the quarter
ending Dec. 31 on sales of $70.1 million, A) Commodore lost
$77.2 million on sales of $237.7 million in the same period.

In the latest report, Commodore said financial limits had thwarted its
ability to supply products, leading to weakened sales. One of its new
products, the Amiga CD32 video game, had sold poorly in Europe, where
the company did most c

The company’s net worth turned negative in the fiscal year ended last
June 30.

[ts stock, which had traded at around $3 per share before the quarterly
results were announced last month, closed unchanged at 87 1/2 cents per
share on the New York Stock Exchange Friday.

“This is a company that briefly captured the attention of the American
market and didn’t go where the market was going,” said David Cours!
editor of the newsletter P.C, Letter in San Mateo, Calif. “They just never
managed to change with the marketplace,”

While grabbing some market share and attention in the late 1970s,
Commodore's products were something between PCs and game machines
“and never quite became either,” Coursey said.

Commodore started 40 years ago as a typewriter repair company in the

ation of both

its business,

Volume 1, Number 2

AND Compu

Bronx. Its extension to the adding machine business paved the way for it to
make calculators and then personal computers by the mid-1970s.
Commodore competed with Radio Shack for the first computers sold to

homes and ¢ ‘garded figure in the

founder Jack Tramiel becamea highly-
fledgling PC industry,

By the early 1980s, it was overshadowed in the PC business by Apple
Computer Inc, and IBM. Software manufacturers didn’t create as much
software for Commodore's Am line as it did for Apple and IBM-

compatible machines,
In recent years, most of Commodore's business was in Europe.
NewTek Inc, of Topeka, Kan., created a product called Video Toaster
that converted Commodore's Amiga to a video-editing system. The $2,500
product was popular with small advertising agencies and home hobbyists.

The company’s phones were busy Friday night.

COMMODORE INTERNATIONAL <CBU.N> TO
LIQUIDATE
NEW YORK, April 29 (Reuter) - Commodore International Ltd, said it
1 thetransfer ofits for the benefit of its creditors
ajor subsidiary, Commodore Electronics Ltd. into voluntary
liquidation, The company said this is the initial phase of an orderly
liquidation of both companies, which are incorporated in the Bahamas, by
the Bahamas Supreme Court, —New York Newsdesk 212-603-3310,

Sets to trustees

COMMODORE COMPUTER GOES BANKRUPT,
FRANKFURT UNIT SAYS
FRANKFURT (MAY 5) DPA - Commodore International Ltd., the home
personal computercompany, faces bankruptcy and has filed for liquidation
which will see its units around the world closed or sold off, Commodore of
Germany said Thursday.

A spokeswoman for Commodore Bueromaschinen GmbH in Frankfurt
said that the Nassau, Bahamas-based parent company hoped to continue
operations on a smaller scale, while still keeping the “Commodore” and
“Amiga” trade names, with the help of an Asian investor.

“Only five peoplehere know the name oftheinvestor,” saidspokeswoman
Karola Bode.

She said that some of the 35 Commodore units worldwide had already
been liquidated, Others stand to be closed while those which were still
profitable-including companiesin Scandinavia, Italy, Canadaand Germany
- would probably continue operations.

Inthe 1992-93 year which ended last June 30, Commodore International
lost 356 million dollars, on turnover of 591 million. At the time it had some
1,500 employees.

Commodore made its reputation by establishing the personal computer
asa home product. After 1982, some 16 to 17 million of the 64-kilobyte
“peoples computer” C64 were sold worldwide.

Commodore World

But the company ran into problems toward the end of the 1980s in
finding a successor to the C64, at the same time that the competition was
developing and marketing increasingly sophisticated PCs at lower prices,
market analysts say.

A further mistake may have been Commodore moving too sluggishly
and too late in entering the market of IBM-compatible computers.

RIO Relocates

Rio Computer, U.S. distributors of the Skantronix Handy Scanner and
other European products, has recently relocated, Their new address and
phone number are:

Rio Computer

572 Tam O'Shanter
Las Vegas, NV 89109
Phone: 702-369-2633

Rio h
Replay

so recently discontinued distribution of the once popular Action
artridge, manufactured by Datel, Ltd,, a British-based company.

Hewlett-Packard Releases New Lasers

Hewlett-Packard, a Santa Clara based manufacturer of computer
peripherals, has recently released updated versions of their popular HP
LaserJet 4 and HP LaserJet 4ML laser printers. The new models, the HP
LaserJet 4 Plus ($1839) and HP ret AML Plus ($2479), offer higher
speed printing using less memory than the earlier versions, The company
also claims that these new 600 dpi, 12 page per minute printers use less
toner and consume less power than their predecessors. Both printers offer
PCLS interpreters, while the 4ML version also offers Adobe Postscript

Geta

FREE DISK
OF SOFTWARE!

64/128

No kidding. Call 1-800-831-2694
now or mail your valuable FREE SOFT-
WARE CERTIFICATE, and we'll send
you a FREE issue of LOADSTAR", the
Commodore” software subscription. That
way, you can explore our revolutionary

Call now or mail in th
CERTIFICATE,
LOADSTAR, the Commodore software subscription.

Call 1-800-831-2694 or

Ifyou like your
scription with two more

Level 2. Hewlett-Packard Co., Dire! Marketing Organization, P.O, Box 58059,
Santa Clara, CA 95051; 800-752-0900.

Titus Reaffirms Commodore Product Line
‘Titus Software, producers of noted games including Crazy Cars and The
Blues Brothers, recently contacted Commodore dealers concerning their
game titles for the C-64/128, Commodore World contacted Cindy Hitz,
Marketing Director for Titus, who stated that they receive many calls from
Commodore users looking for software, and confirmed that several titles
were still available. Look to future issues of Commodore World for reviews
of these programs. Titus Software Corporation, 20432 Corisco Street,
Chatsworth, CA 91311; 818-709-6537.

LoadStar Celebrates 10th Anniversary
Congratulations go to LoadStar and its staff who celebrated their L0th
Anniversary of producing their high-quality disk-based magazine for the
Commodore 64, Not only are we happy tosee them celebrate this milestone,
but we anxiously look forward to the next 10 years of LoadStar,

Xetec Printer Interfaces

Xetec, a long-time supplier of hardware products for the Commodore 64,
Commodore 128, Amiga, and Atari ST computers recently announced that
it wouldno longer be producing the Super Graphics and Super Graphics Jr.
printer interfaces for the Commodore 64 and 128. Supplies of these
eswere rapidly depleted from most dealers, leaving the Micro R&D
MW-350printerinterface asthe last remaining product still being produced
in this category. This marks the end of the last Commodore 64/128
products offered by Xetec, who once dominated the Commodore printer
interface market and also produced the Lt. Kernal hard drive,

EE SO)
FREE SOFTWARE

and we'll send you a FREE issue of

1-318-221-8718
rvice?

n complete month trial sub-

just $19.95". Since your first issue is

“subscribe-to-a-disk-of-software” concept
for yourself!

Each monthly issue contains 7-10
programs and features on two 5.25" disks
or one 3.5” disk. Imagine getting features
like these on every

ue:
*Utilities — *Puzzles ~— *Games
*Applications Tutorials *Graphies
*Music *Reviews — *and more!

ciMOO1-2/94

Volume 1, Number 2

FREE, you'll save 1/3 off the regular 3-month subscription price of $29.95.
When you subscribe, you'l receive a FRI Special Bonus Disk of some
of our most popular programs, You'll also have the option to subscribe for
a longer term and save more. Whether or not you subscribe, your first

ue is FREE.
Name: Check disk format:
Addres: 03.5" 05.25"

i cWLO34

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* In Canada $23.30 (regularly $34.95), Offer available in U.S. and Canada
only. International-call for information. Allow 4.6 weeks for delivery,

9 Commodore World

Everyone's talking aboutit on the
nets. There is no end to the
downloads of Commodore jabber
these days. Commodore Business
Machines, once THE personal
computer giant, both here and
abroad, has finally shut its doors.
No power on earth could stop it,
and if anyone was praying for
Commodore, the prayers bounced
off the stratosphere.

I'm reminded of a biblical
proverb, “don't pray forthedead...”;
yet around the world, hundreds of
thousands (if not millions) of
Commodore enthusiasts, from 8-bit
C-64 users to 32-bit A4000 users,
are hoping and praying for some
reprieve. Would some larger
company purchase Commodore's
technology and revive some of the
Oh, the

to make other PC platforms more
powerful. 1 know this is an 8-bit
magazine, and probably no
computer is more hated by this.
readership than the Amiga, but
Commodore had a good thing
going. Just like the C-64, the Amiga
was better than everything else,
more efficient, faster, and easier to
use. To approach the multimedia

power of Commodore's Amiga, the
PC must be supe’d up, and it really

Volume 1, Number 2

THE
GONNECTION

News FROM COMMODORE-RELATED VENDORS AND PUBLISHERS

still pales. That's beca
supe’ up the Amig;
Video T les you
every week on Babylon 5, SeaQuest
and other television shows. If you
want a PC or a MAC to do Babylon
'ype effects, you'dneed gobs more
RAM, and thousands of more
buck$—and that’s just for the
software, not the hardware. Indeed,
the last time I
similar to the Toaster, the software
alone cost over $8000—about
$4000 more than a decent Toaster
system. Let’s hopeit’s been reduced
for the masses since then.
Commodore has always been
shunned by the market. remember
1984, when C-64’s could still be
found in every PCstore, Kmart, and
even newly sprouting video rental
stores. There was probably nobetter
selling PC, yet the word has been
steady for 10 straight years: “Drop
the C-64. It’s dead.” Actually the
feeling was more like: “Drop the
C-64 before you find yourself the
only personin the world usingone.”
s asked myself, what do I
re if everyone else is using a MAC
ora PC—unless] want to pirateand
copy and borrow? Instead what has
happened? A steady succession of
obsolete MS-DOS computers. Try
tosell someone a 386SX, and they'll
call it a piece of junk. I remember

se when you
you have the
ter, which

a Mac system

when that was the rage only two
years ago. I'd really hate to buy
486DX or Pentium MS-DOS
computer, and then find out that
Windoze version “Next Friday” will
run too slowly on it. Maybe in a
couple of years the market will
stabilize, and I'll buy in—but I still
love my C-64/128 and Amiga, Ihave
286 16 MHz(remember when that
supposed to be blazing fa:
computer that I literally NE
EVER use.

Every day Imarvel at how much I
love my C-64’sscreen editor. There's
nothing like it in the world. Since
I'm currently on a fat-reduced diet,
I have to calculate calories and fat
every day. It’s the easiest thing in
the world for me to type one line in
the immediate mode:

10042 (80+45+5410) 41404310

The line above represents the
calories of various foods I've eaten
today. There’s no easier way for me
todoit. Can't doit ona spreadsheet
Calculators don’tlet you
go back and edit or plan ahead for
the rest of the day. You can't do that
on an IBM or Amiga without
booting up a C-64 emulator. In fact
I've done that. For me, the C-64's
commandlineinterface (immediate
mode) is a wonderful way to use a

this e;

computer. It is NOT the best way to
launch programs.

I truly love my C-64, Actually 1
love the 64 mode since I only touch
C-128's as of late. I enjoy
programming the machine.
LOADSTAR has said it before, and

10

we'll say it again: We not only love
programming and editing our two-
disk magazine, but it’s profitable!
We implore all Commodore
enthusiasts not to fall by the
wayside. Don't give all your
favorite Commodore vendors the
preemptive heave-ho because you
feel that they're about to drop you.
Call or write the vendor, Ask them
their plans for the future. How's the
market? LOADSTAR is extremely
successful. We'd be complete and
utter fools to drop our loyal
subscribers, and move on the PC.
Forone thing, wealready havea PC,
MAC and Apple II magazine, As
ys said, as long as our
readers keep subscribing, we'll keep

we’

coming up with new programs,
graphics, tutorials, utilities, and
music, Commodore's death means
little to us. Commodore has never
helped us. Even when we've
communicated with them, they
were condescending, and cared very
little about our market. The people
whoarereally hurt by thisare Amiga
third party developers. They'll
probably have a tougher time
allocating money for R&D. What of
Commodore's custom chips?
Where will they come from? In the
longrun, this will mean little. We're
all pioneers. The personal computer
world is a decade young. Every
computerin theworldisa Model-T,
even the Pentiums and PowerPCs.
Ten)
how we got along at 1-100 MHz,
one processor, and no voice

'sfromnow, we'llall wonder

recognition.
Jeff Jones
Associate Editor, LoadStar

Commodore World

THE
GONNECTION

know that you can use an AM radio
in your computer room as a
“lightning detector”, asit will report
lightning (heardascracklesorstatic)

a variety of sources, This issue has
almost 300 disk blocks of useful bits
of information.

We here at CEE-64 Alive! have been
very busy supporting the CEE-64,
128 and PLUS/4 computers. As
reported in the last issue of
Commodore World, CEE-64 Alive! had
a special interest group (SIG) on
Delphi. We regret that due to
unforeseen circumstances we'vehad
to discontinue this SIG.

Volume 3 Issue#2 hasbeen mailed
to our subscribers, and it’s another
huge issue this time around with not
one, not two, but THREE disks! New

toourlineupis“Skyhigh”, a column
by Jan Siren about using Sky Travel,
using current astronomical events
to explore the world of the heavens.
Who said the PLUS/4 is an orphan?
Please don’t tell Alvin Conrow this,
as thirty-two of his articles on the
PLUS/4 appear in this
to admit to being a bit of newbie
with the PLUS/4, but I certainly
learned a great deal from these
articles, and not just about the
PLUS/4, either. Forinstance, did you

issue. I have

long before the skies in your
neighborhood become dark with
storm clouds?

64 Alive!
Vol. 3, Issue #2 include a review of
Digimaster, a new digitized sound
program; a review of TopDesk,
Germany's GEOS DeskTop
replacement; plus several programs
from Australia for just about every
interest, including dieting (it is that
time of year, after all), genealogy,

Other goodies in CE!

invoicing, or designing circuits with
a CAD program.
Regular features, such as

“Litlbits”, which is far from little,
includestidbits ofinformation from

s office (he's CEE-64 Alive!’s
publisher), as I live in the Midwest
while he'sin Sacramento, California,
However, limagine it’s quitea sight,
as Jack has been putting together
collections of software packages for
CEE-64 Alive! to offer at reasonable
prices, including GEOS, 128,
PLUS/4, Fun Graphics Machine Clip
Art, Australian games, and Ham
Radio collections. I'm sure I left a
category or two out, but I’m sure you
get the idea.
Meanwhile, it’s time for me to
start on our next issue,
~ Gaclyne Moranec
itor, CEE-64 Alive!

ieHar

This month our CP/M guy, Mike
Gordillo, is back! Explore this
powerful mode on your C128 with
us. This is a whole new world that
your commodore can open up for
you. Frontier time!

Mike Eglestone is back in class
with his Telecommunications, Your

commodore, and YOU. Get your
modem and term program running
so youcan log on to the Internet and
seejust what R.J.Smulkowski,
the Cyberspace Cowboy, is talking
about!
Sometimes it’s
Check out MikeG

not your fault!
silsdorf’s DOS Bugs

and Quirks. Some you may have
encountered, some you may want to
avoid.

PRGis loaded! Check out ournew
text readers, Text to Screen & Text
to Printer by Ernest Barkman,
complete with word wrap and a
paper saver option. These puppies
run on any commodore 8-bit
machine! James T. Jones’ Label
Printer makes quick labels a snap!

On this month's Spinner we have
Ted Meyer's Bingo! This is a full
featured Bingo program that can
even keep track ofeverybody’s cards!
Itwilleventell you who wor

can continue the game until
everybody has a Bingo!

This, issue on
newsstands, is our First Annual
Rarities issue! We've gone through
our listings, updated them, added
more and here they are! The largest
list of commodore supporters we've
ever published, Plus Scot Derrer's
own Rarities column and a special
You won't want to miss it!

dieHard, the Flyerforcommodore
8bitters is now able at many B,
Dalton, Bookstar, and other Barnes
and Noble book stores.

- Brian L, Crosthwaite, Editor

our second

FUN GRAPHICS

MACHINE

GETTING OVER THE FGM HUMP

Getting started with the FUN
GRAPHICS MACHINE (FGM) is
without question the hardest hurdle

Volume 1, Number 2

to jump. So why bother, RIGHT?
Wrong! That's what! thoughtat first.
Month's later, and I emphasize the

11

“s" onmonth’s, [found myselfdoing
the unthinkable. I started to read
the MANUAL (when all else fails,
read the instructions, is my motto).
After a few pages the light came on.
This program will do ANYTHING
my printer can handle, Now I knew
why to bother getting started with
FGM. Myaddiction grew, asl usedit
for everything.

Lets kick some of the hurdles. I
willassumeyou'vebeenlettingFGM

collect dust as I did. From the

beginning:
Place your BACKUP COPY of
FGM in your drive and enter:

RUN

Ifyou are using JiffyDOS it will load
bit slower with fast load
cartridges. A MENU willsoon appear
asking you to select a section. The

(continued on next page)

Commodore World

THE
CGonnNectTION

Fun Graphics Machine
(continued from previous page)

selection bar defaults to CREATOR. Press the
RETURN» key, Next you are asked if you want
touse FGM'sfastload. Donot use FGM 'sfastload
ifyouare using JiflyDOS, a cartridge, orany drive
buta 1541,

Now the MAIN MENU for CREA'TOR is
showing. The highlight bar de
number 4, ( sc
Press the number <

ults to option

key or the <RETURI

key, What's this! A bunch of trash is showing on
the sereen, This is correct, FGM looks for Hi-Res
screens left behind by other programs. Now press
and hold down the following three keys:
<SHIFT><CTRL><E>. A prompt will show
RASE’; press the <Y> key and the screen will
clea what! No way; I've got a goofy looking
dog. The dog is your cursor. You can move it

around with thecursorkeys ikeany other cursor,
Try it, This cursor happens to also be your
GRAPHIC BUFFER no.3. Youh iRAPHIC
BUFFERS to choose from in . Press
the <2> key to see a cat. Now the cat is your
cursor. Press <3 >again tose the dog. By pressing,
<1> through <6> you will see six different
graphics. You can load your own graphics in
buffers 1 through
(GRAPHIC) on the screen, press the <P> key to
PASTE it to the Hi-Res screen, The dog should
have flickered and a faint ding sounded to let you
knowit was pasted, Press the cursor keys again to
see two dogs, One is your cursor, while the other
is part of the Hi-Res sereen.

Letsadd some text to ourscreen, Press the <P>
key. You are now in MODE. Your text
cursor is now a small square box 8 pixels by 8
pixels, Use the cursor keys to see it move around.
For fun type your name on the s
five TEXT BUFFERS to choose from while in the
JR SECTION of FGM, Press and hold the
L> key and press the <1> key. Now type
something. The textis different, Usethe<CTRL>
key alongwith thekeys forthe numbers I through
5 to select any of the five TEXT BUF! S.

To escape from any MODE, press the
<RETURN> key, It will track back to the MAIN
MENU.

Next month 1 will explain TEXT and
GRAPHICS MODES in more detail. And how to
load your own graphics and text into FGM.

- Jerty Freadman

fo place the cursor

ereen, You have

Volume 1, Number 2

User Group CoNnNECTION

SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL USER GROUP

Alabama

Birmingham Commodore Club
PO Box 59564

Birmingham, AL 35259-9564

California

C-128 West User's Group
17047 Devanah St.
Covina, CA 91722

‘The Fresno Sixty-Fourum
PO Box 16098

Fresno, CA 93755

Colorado

Western Slope Commodore User Group
P.O. Box 81

Mack, CO 81525

Florida

Commodore Computer Club of Jacksonville
141 Mango Court

Middleburg, FL 32068

Port Orange Commodore User's Group

52 Windward Crt.

Port Orange, FL 32127

Hawaii

Commodore Hawaii User’s Group
c/o M.N, Daniels

46-329 Kumoo Loop

Kaneohe, HI 96744-3532

Mlinois
Champaign-Urbana C.U.G.
2010 W. William
Champaign, IL 61821

Indiana

Midwest Computer Users Group
P.O, Box 9311

Highland, IN 46322

lowa

Commo-Hawk Commodore User's Group
PO Box 2724

Cedar Rapids, [A 52406-2724

Michigan

Michigan Commodore User's Group
800 Lloyd

Madison Heights, MI 48071-1915

Missouri

Commodore User’s Group of Kansas City
PO Box 36034

Kansas City, MO 64111

Pennsylvania
Lehigh Valley C.U.G.
c/o 931 Lawrence Drive
Emmaus, PA 18049

South Dakota

Sioux Empire Commodore Club
1932S. Menlo Ave.

Sioux Falls, SD. 57105-2717

Texas

Commodore Houston User's Group
PO Box 441252

Houston, TX 77244-1252

Correspondence Groups

Last issue we incorrectly listed the group
below as an Illinois group; it is in fact a
correspondence group made up of users
that keep in touch via mail, There has also
been a change in their addres
Meeting 64/128 Users Thru the Mail
c/o Francis Redmond

Route 7, Box 7614

Palestine, TX 75801

Attention User Groups!
Send us your group's name, contact person's name and phone number, when and where you
meet, number of users, and an address where users can write to you. Send your info to:

CW UG Connection

c/o Creative Micro Designs, Inc.

P.O, Box 646

East Longmeadow, MA 01028-0646

12

Commodore World

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This collection includes
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of tips and tricks. It also
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Volume 1, Number 2

13

Commodore World

Top Tips

FROM OUR READERS AND STAFF

24-Pin Printing

In our Premier issue of Commodore World, our
feature article on Printers & Interfaces had a short
program that helped adapt newer 24 pin printers
tosomeolderC-64/128 software. This suggestion
prompted a letter from Mr, Arthur Herbig of
Derwood, Maryland who attempted to use the
program with Printshop and his Panasonic
KXP-1123 24-pin printer, In his letter, he states
that our program didn’t work, and his document
continued to print elongated. However, another
program which was offered in Loadstar #105
worked fine for him. The two programs are listed
below; the firstis ours, thesecondisfrom Loadstar,

Program 1:

Program 2:
0
PRI

4,4
IT#4, CH
CLOSE4

27) 4"3"+CHRS (21);

Okay, so why does one program work with
Printshop on a 24-pin printer while the other
program does not? There area couple of possible
reasons. First, there is the difference in the way
that the two programs try toaccomplish the task.
The Commodore World program uses an Escape
“A” followed by to set the line
spacing to 2 of an inch. The LoadStar program

pe “3” to adjust line spacing to ?Ya16

uses an E
ofan inch,

Itis our understanding that there have been a
couple of different revisions of the Printshop
printer drivers, which may explain why one
adjustment works but the other does not. We feel
that both drivers are going to be useful with
different programs. One will probably work with
certain programs while the other will work witha
different set of programs.

We plan on looking into this issue further, and
as soon as we get a chance to speak with George

Volume 1, Number 2

Wells, the renowned printer expert who gave us
the tip, we will probably shed some more light on
the subject. So in the mean time, try both
programs and use the one that best suits your

particular application.

Laser PrintShop
Here isa tip from Robert Reeves of Whittier, CA,
for those of you who might be using an Epson
Action Laser printer. If you are trying to print
signs in Printshop and are having trouble with
the sign getting split into two pages, Robert
suggests using 8.5"'x14" (legal) size paper and
change the paper size to legal on the printer,
Also, if you are using Paperclip III with this
printer, change the page length from 66 to 62.

RUN Paint Mouse Fix
A few weeks ago we got a call from a user asking
if the new CMD SmartMouse would have the
same problem that the Japanese version of the
1351 had with RUN Paint. While we too had
experienced mouse problems with RUN Paint,
wehad noidea what this had to dowith aJapanese
version of the mouse. The caller directed us to a
tip published in the November 1989 issue of
RUN, in the Mail Run column, Sure enough, here
they stated that it was a “Japanese-made version
of the 1351 mouse” that caused the RUN Paint
pointer to jump around on the screen
After looking into this problem, we di:
thatthe problem had nothing at all to do with the
version of the mouse; the true problem lies in
RUN Paint itself, which fails to provide a proper
delay after switching the internal POT registers
to read joystick port 2. The program below will
correct the problem without affecting any other
functionsofthe program. Runth
ona 64 using a backup copy of RUN Paint,

covered

452A | 10 A=A+1:IFA=1THENLOAD"O
B.RP”,8,1
20 POK eels

5,"S0:0B.RP

1AE7
D006
apc7 | 40
46, PEEK (175)

45, PEEK (1174

+ POKE4
B.RP",8
D218

TOP TIPS Needs Your Input!

Each issue we'll print the very best tips we receive from our readers. One of these will also be
chosen as the top tip of the issue, and the contributor will receive a special bonus from
Commodore World. Send us your tips on using and programming your Commodore 64 or 128,
and you may just be the one to get honored as the contributor of Commodore World's Top Tip!

Send your tips to:

CW Top Tips

c/o Creative Micro Designs, Inc.

P.O, Box 646

East Longmeadow, MA 01028-0646

14

Commodore World

Dependable Service for your Commodore!
C64, 1541, C128, or 1571: $15.00 PLUS PARTS

Send computer (& power supply)
or disk drive with name, address,
phono, & describe problem. We'll
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Payment can be COD, VISA, MIC,
or DISCOVER.. Minimum charge
for estimate only is $10.00.

We Also Sell the Following:

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Serial Cable, 6-pin DIN, 12° 12.95
Commodore Power Supply for C-64 19.95
Commodore Power Supply for C-128 39.95
Power Cord for 1541 4.95
Power Supply for 1541-II 32.50
New! CD-32, USA version 399.00

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503 East Street, Pittsfield, MA 01201

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Commodore World

Just For Starters

by Stose Vander Ark

SD

FOR USERS JUST GETTING STARTED INCOMMODORE COMPUTING

Lastissue | started off this column by saying that
my computer talks a lot. But then I proceeded to
spend most of my allotted word count talking
about how you, the user, talks to the computer.
I did that on purpose, since talking to the
computer by means of typing on the keyboards
one of the very first things you'll do once you get
everything plugged in and powered up. (Take a
look at the sidebar accompanying this column
for more information about getting the cables all
hooked up correctly.)

But now that you've started typing commands.
into the computer using that built-in computer
language called BASIC, you'll need to know more
about how the computer talks back to you. As 1
mentioned last month, the Commodore tells you
right off the bat that it’s ready to get started by
saying “READY” and flashing its cursor.
handy thing to know, actually; if we started the
computer and it didn't say “READY”, we'd
to figure out what was keeping it so busy that it
couldn't stop to talk to us.

Now I teach a class of third graders for whom
computers are as natural as recycling bins and
roller blades. But when one of our computers
starts doing something they don't expect, likenot
sayingit's "READY" whenitshouldornotloading
a program, they get frustrated. All of a sudden,
that familiar old machine in the corner has
become a blithering idiot. Some of them will try
one or two quick fixes they have seen me use
before, but usually theyjust nd frown
and holler, “Go get Mr. Vander Ark!” They know,
you see, that I understand what the computer is
saying and that I know how to tell it to get back to
work,

that’s a

ave

Volume 1, Number 2

You, of course, won't be able to use the same
strategy that my third graders use; you won't be
” You can,

able to “go get Mr. Vander Ar
howev
what the computer says when it isn’t acting the
way you expect.

The folks who designed the Commodore 64
and 128 knew that you and I would often need
information about what was going on with our
achines, so they included a set of “error
messages” into the operating system (that’s the
built-in set of routines and commands that run
theshow, asyou might recall). Error messages are
one of the most obvious ways the computer hasto
tell you what's happening. To see an example, try
typing “QWERTY” at the cursor and hitting
ETURN, After a brief moment, you'll see the
words “SYNTAX ERROR" on the screen. That is
your computer's way of telling you that it has no
idea what “QWERTY” means. The words
“SYNTAX ERROR" are an error message, telling

, learn for yourself how to understand

16

you that the computer doesn’t understand what
you just told it to do.

I think it’s fairly safe to assume that you won't
usually be trying to type commands like
“QWERTY” into your computer. So why does the
operating system need such an error message?
You'll understand that well enough the more you
type commands; the most common reason for a
“SYNTAX ERROR’ typing mistake, like
entering LOAF instead of LOAD, Then, instead
of cheerfully loading your program as you would
expect, your computer will just sit there. That's
when my third graders will come looking for me,
That's when you can look at the screen and see
that your computer is telling you with an error
message what the trouble is.

You might wonder why the computer can’t
'm sorry, I didn’t understand that last

just say
message.” Asa matter of fact, there’sno particular
reason why it can’t. The phrases the computer
uses are stored verbatim somewhere inside in its
memory andifyouknow how to program youcan
actually change them to say whatever you want. |
can only suppose that the ori igners used
fancy, technical terms RROR to
save memory space, since every character of the
message has to be stored. The trend nowadays,
however, is to make error messages a lot more
informative and helpful, since most computers
havea lot more memory to play with than the 64
and 128 have.

There are other error messages you might
encounter as you work with your computer.
Another one you will see is “OUT OF DATA
ERROR,” whichsounds pretty alarming, Chances
are, that means that you've just accidentally

Commodore World

“IE WE STARTED THE COMPUTER AND
IT DIDN’T SAY “READY”, weE’pbD

HAVE TO F

IGURE OUT WHAT WAS
KEEPING IT SO BUSY THAT IT
COULDN’T STOP TO TALK TO US.”

Making All the Right Connections

What's the first thing anyone does
with a computer? You gotit: they plug
itin. Now that can be a daunting task
for a first-time computer user,
especially if they boughtthe computer
used, without a manual. So here’s a
quick run through of what you need to
do to get your Commodore computer
plugged in and ready to run:

First of all, you'll want to make sure
that the place you've selected for your
computerhas enough grounded outlets
(the ones with three holes). A very
handy way to take care of this
requirement is to use a power strip with
abuilt-in surge protector. Using a power
strip is more than just convenient,
however. It's commonsense. Thatsurge
protector will can prevent a lot of
problems and repairs down the road.
Since Commodore equipmentis scarce
and knowledgeable repair personnel
scarcer still, the surge protector can
mean the life or death of your system.
You'll also want to find a place well
ventilated and relatively free of dust. A
phone line is essential if you plan to do
anything on line (with amodem, thatis,
like on the Internet or GEnie).

Once you have a place selected, you
can begin hooking things up. The
computer unit itself has a power pack,
one end of which plugs into the wall and
the other into your computer. It's a good
idea to keep this power pack away from
the rest of your equipment, since it
could damage disks and cause
interferencein the monitor. The monitor,
disk drives, and printeralso have power

Volume 1, Number 2

cables. Plug in each of these
components (with the power off to the
power strip) and arrange things so that
you can reach everything easily. If you
wanttobe able toturnthe whole system
on at once with a switch on the power
strip, make sure that switch is going to
be accessible as well.

At this point, you have a whole bunch
of separate pieces with no way for them
to talkto each other. Let's hook them up
one ata time, starting with the monitor.
Ifyou havea Commodore monitor, there
are several ways thatyou might need to
hook it up, depending on the screen
modes of which yoursystemis capable.
On the back of your computer you'll find
several places, often called ports, where
you can plug in different sizes and
shapes of cables. The small round one
will let you connect your 64 or 128 toa
monitor or to a television set by way of
a TV/COMPUTER switch box. There
are two larger round ports, one of which
is for a video cable and the other for
your disk drive. Make sure you don't
force a cable into one of these ports;
that cable might actually be intended
forthe other port. The 128 also includes
a vaguely rectangular port which hooks
the computer up to an 80-column
monitor.

Once you've determined how to hook
up the monitor, the rest is easy. Your
disk drive connects to the computer
using the other round port and that
rather thick cable with the large round
plug on either end. You'll notice when
you look at the back of the disk drive

17

that there are two identical ports to
chose from. Itmakesno difference which
one you use; the other can be used to
run another cable on to another disk
drive if you have one. Commodore
printers also can be connected to your
system this way, into the extra port on
the back of the last disk drive in the line.
Running drives linked together like this
is called “daisy-chaining.”

If you don't have a Commodore or
Commodore-ready printer, you willneed
some kind of an interface to connect
your computer to it. For a discussion of
printers and connection options, check
out the article in last month's issue of
Commodore World.

Otherdevices, such asmodems, RAM.
devices, cartridges, andsoonalsoneed
to be attached to your system before
you power up. Check the documentation
for each device to find out how it should
be installed,

There has been a friendly debate
running for years in the Commodore
community about the best orderin which
to start up your system's various
components. Some people are
convinced that the drives and monitor
shouldbe turned on before the computer
itself; others are just as certain that it's
the other way around. | personally just
hitthe switch on my powerstrip and kick
everything on at once. One thing to
remember: never switch on a 64 and
1541 with a disk in the drive.

-SVA

Commodore World

moved the cursor over the word READY before
you hit RETURN. The cursor is under your
control, you see, using the arrow keys, and if you
move it onto a word that’s already on the sereen
and press RETURN, the computer will assume
you just entered that word as a command. That's
very helpful if you want to, say, give the same
command twice orifyou just received aSYNTAX
ERROR and you want to fix your typing, But if
you hit RETURN when the cursor is on the same
line as some other word, the computer will
probably not know what you mean; the result will
be a SYNTAX ERROR, An exception is READY,
and here's why: the word READ is actually a
command in BASIC, so the computer tries to
READ when you tell it to, and since the READ is
followed bya Y, it tries to "READ Y". It can't doit
and it tries to tell you so by saying that it’s out of
data.

There is a list in the manual that came with

your computer of all the error messages the
Commodore uses. That list gives

explanations for what the errors mean a

ome
well, so
it's handy to have around. Unfortunately, the
writers of the manual aren't always very good at
putting things into plain language, which is
probably why most people don’t read manuals if
they can help it. For example, you might see the
error message “DEVICE NOT PRESENT” when

you try to load a program. The manual defines
this as follows: “The required I/O device was not
available for an OPEN, CLOSE, CMD, PRIN’
INPUT#, or GET#", That may be true, of course,
but what it really means for you is that you
probably didn't turn on your disk drive and so

thecomputercan'tfindit...thedevice youwanted,
the disk drive, is apparently not present.

It would begreat ifthere werean crrormessage
‘on the screen every time something went wrong,
but unfortunately thisisn’t the way it works. A lot
of the errors you'll encounter as you try to load
and run programs will actually not be computer
problems but disk drive problems. The disk drive
has its own set of error messages, but they don’t
appear on the screen automatically. Instead,
there’salittle light on the drive that just blinks on
and offas away of saying, “Hey, something went
wrong!" Then it’s up to you to type a command to
ask the drive what the problem is. Sometimes,
though, adrive problem will makeyour computer
sort of freeze up, which means you won't see a
cursor to type in anything. If you don’t see a
cursor, your computer is stuck trying to talk to
your disk drive but the drive is not answering.
You can manually tell your computer to give up

the attempt by pressing the RUN/STOP key; if

that doesn’t work, you can press RUN/STOP and
RESTORE atthe same time to reset the computer.

Ifthat fails, you'll usthaveto switch the computer
offand back on again to clear things up.
Aslongasthe disk drive'serrorlightis blinking,
though, an error message is being saved in a
special spot in the drive's memory for you to
check if you want. With the BASIC that comes
built into a

sa fairly simple task: you
type PRINT DS$ and the message shows up on
your screen, On the 64, thought, things are a lot
tougher. Here’s the sequence youneed to type in:

10 OPEN 15,8,15 <RETURN>

20 INPUT #15,EN,EMS,ET,ES <RETURN>
409 PRINT EN,EMS, ETURN>:
40 CLOSE 15 <RETURN>

Remember, thisisin the computer's language,
soyou have to obey all the rules and type thingsin
exactly as you see it here. When you have typed
this all in, type RUN and press <RETURN> to
execute all the commands in order. The result
will bea listing ofall the error information on the
screen.

The disk drive is one of the most important
devices that you attach to your 64 or 128, so next
month we'll continue this di ion from here,
talking about various types of drives and how you
use them. In the meantime, have fun with your
Commodore!

COMMODORE TRIVIA

Reprinted from Commodore Triv #1 on the Internet, courtesy of Jim Brain, Brain Innovations,

$000 Commodore started out into computing
with the PET series of computers. What
did the letters P.

stand for?
$001 Commodore planned tomanufacture two
successors to the popular Commodore
64 home computer, and both were
intended to be business machines, What
were these two machines originally called,
and what were the differences between

the two?

1 ‘Sioq punoy)
Joc punoy) 9ZgT

Wad “(e OC aaenbs) ZO8 Sd 6O0S
£20) ESTING ‘208 SAW 8008
TIITOIA 2008

jaoeyd ysay ay uy apn sty
uMo PrNoYs youn ‘gZgT ay) Aq uaxeyAAO
pue pajueyddns ¢jyamb svay saquud

Volume 1, Number 2

Questions

How much BASIC free memory does a
VIC-20 have (unexpanded)?

$002
$003 What early 80's Commodore software
company had a Light Bulb as a company
logo?

What was the model number of the disk
drive used with the VIC-20?

$004

$005 What was the model number of the

cassette device used with the VIC-20?

Answers

sty, isjiod/a zaded yo yapias pny yueaut
1G°8 1YSNoY auoawos ‘<puaplag “taded
uG'Z an ATUO pynos ‘uoeoTuNUWOSsTIE

ve xq ‘yor Gg TST OIA 900$
OEST-OIA SO0$

‘paads
[elas soysey Kuo T PGT seaues-OPST-DIA FO0$
SMIOM IIT sad EO0$
DISVAIWVUOSAAG ESSE sey AML ZOOS

18

$006 What was the model number of the

printer used with the VIC-20?

$007 What was the model number of the 16K
RAM expander used with the VIC-20?

Commodore introduced 3 printers that
used the same printer mechanism, What

are the model numbers?

$008

$009

What is the difference between the
printers in question $008?

*paddesas
€ ay) INoge arow yon
Mouy Jaaau Ajqeqord |],aM ‘WYY JO
MPO YIM “p syd ayr OVuy pata pgz ayy,
Cay soumnu e snyd pavoq say zvpnBas
at) pasnoy yu) ased adds p snjq JadaLy V

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Commodore World

Viewers who tuned into CNN on the evening of
April 29, 1994, or the Sunday Morning edition of
NBC's Today show two days later saw and heard
the news about Commodore, A brief, tersely
worded announcement to the Associated Press
after the close of the stock market on April 29th
bore the bad news: Commodore was liquidating.
In Dickens’ era, Debtor's Prison would have
stepped in long before Commodore's financial
whizs accumulated their enormous $350 million
debt, especially with quarterly earnings of only
$70-odd million to offset the heavy |

Atlonglast, thatsame company that designed,
engineered and built your beloved C-64/C-128
publicly announced it’s on the verge of going,
belly-up, Not that it matters a whole lot—after
all, they all but totally ceased to recognize their
record-breaking 8-bit product line when Reagan
was still President. Thank the third-party
developers instead for keeping those 8-bits alive
long after Commodore gave them the heave-ho.
That sense of abandonment so familiar to
Commodore 8-bitters is but one of the reasons
they're the Commodore enthusiasts least affected
by the liquidation announcement.

A Look Back...

The primary reason for Commodore's downfall
isclearly their poor marketing decisions, or, more
accurately, a lack of understanding the dynamics
ofmarketing. Theboard ofdirectors hidden away
in New York City and the Bahamas should not be
confused with Commodore Business Machines
in West Chester, Pennsylvania, which performed
admirably. Ifacompanyisasumofitsemployees,
Commodore was perhaps one of the best
computer companies anywhere, one that
managed to attract and fillits hallowed halls with
some of the brightest, most talented people any
company could hope to find.

To reaffirm that statement, a few days ago I
ived a call froma young lady who once served
as one of Commodore Magazine's (remember that
publication?) staffmembers. She later went on to
work in CBM's marketing division. Laid off by
Commodore long ago, she managed to land a
good job at another West Chester, PA-based

Volume 1, Number 2

What Lies Ahead for
Commodore?

company, and still maintained a positive attitude
about Commodore. She offered her candid
opinion of Commodore—describing it as a
wonderful place to work, with unabashed love
for her job.

There's nothing particularly unique about her
statement, as most former Commodore
employees echo similar sentiments. Nearly every
former employee agrees that it was the best job
they ever held, and continue to maintain close
contract with their former fellow employees—a
true rarity in the computer industry, The talent
poolat Commodore wassurely something special.

What Went Wrong?
Surely, those of us close to the source saw this

coming long before it arrived. For a run-down of

events, I'll go back a few years to the early ‘90's,
when my calendar was always filled with marks
denoting Commodore events. There were always
the exciting CES (Consumer Electronic Shows),
the World of Commodore and Ami-Expo shows in
Chicago, New York, Pasadena, Toronto, and the
occasional forays to San Francisco and L.A. We
were always making plans, attending special
events, talking to with numerous Commodore
executives. The company was going places fast,
with the strong leadership of computer
management whiz Harry Copperman, followed
by Jim Dionne—long-time CBM President and
General Manager—the future looked bright.
Commodore rapidly developed some of the
greatest technology of its time. That was clearly

evident at the Chicago CES in 1991. With one of

the largest booths on the floor, Commodore
packed their display with multiple third-party
developers of CDTV titles. Those developers,
under the guidance and finances of Commodore,
created educational and game titles that are still
timely three years later!

Riding the crest of the good years, changes

were made in top management, and the surge of

technology and profits hit a series of internal
political roadblocks. Marketing and advertising
all but ceased, and in June of 1993, Commodore
Business Machines announced a massive $356
million loss, with earnings 50% lower than the

19

By Tam Walihs

previous years, CD32, their Sega/NES weapon,
dy in time for the
Worse yet,

‘93
the board of
directors ceased all communications with
outsiders and no contingency plans were

was not going to be re
Christmas

son.

announced outlining a road to recovery.

Commodore's $350 million faux pas barely
won them a couple of paragraphs in the Wall
Street Journal, Apple easily overshadowed them
with one billion dollar losses, and IBM's $8 billion
in severance and restructuring costs over 18
months made Commodore's $350 million debt
hardly newsworthy by comparison.

A Look Ahead...
There is a silver lining to all this bad news. For
starters, don't worry about the Commodore
machines going away. Too many third-party
developers are interested in the technology to let
it die. A Commodore Shareholders’ Movement
could still have an impact
toexpect multiple, non-exclusive licensing of the
technology. In layman's terms, this means you
may see everything from C-
ona card in the near future. Which isn't to imply
your C-64s and C-128s aren't in good shape
anyway, thanks efforts by third-parties,

Other good news is that Commodore isn't

no reason not

4 clones to Amigas

liquidating in its entirety. Viewed as valuable
assets in the liquidation — process,
income-producing Commodore divisions in
Canada, the UK, and Germany look like they'll
continue as on-going concerns. Getting parts for
your Commodore computer may actually become
easier in the future,

The constraints of professional etiquette
forbids me from disclosing particulars, but suffice
to say Commodore's best technical innovations
were never released. There was no element of
surprise for my colleagues and I when in recent
weeks a number of the world’s largest foreign
electronics giants expressed more than just a
casual interest in bidding on Commodore's
technology. Wait and see—you haven't heard
the last of Commodore!

Commodore World

Foreign Exchange

By Joseph Gaudl

|

THE HILLS ARE ALIVE, WITH THE SOUND OF...PROGRAMMERS?

Allright now, what's the first thing that popsinto
your mind when you hear the name Austria? Julie
Andrews waltzing through mountain fields?
Edelweiss? Downhill skiing? Mozart? Yodeling?
Well, with the exception of Julie it’s all here, but
0 something special for Commodore
-64/128 programmers! As I mentioned
inthe last Foreign Exchange, we will beintroducing,
you from time to time to some of the European
Commodore kinsmen. In this article, Alexander
and Rudi Sanda from Vienna, together with
their programs for RAMLink take center stage.
Alexisa chemist with the Austrian Mineral Oil
Company who enjoys writing programs in his
spare time for himself and his friends. After
purchasing a RAMLink two years ago, he set out
to write programs which support the features
found in RAMLink. His efforts resulted in two
programs, a BASIC program called RAMLink
Manager for the C-128 and a Machine Language
program called File Manager for the C-64,
RAMLink Manager can be easily adjusted to fit
your personal needs—it’s basically a framework
onto which you may build. By inserting BASIC
commands in the program the color of the text
can be altered, other programs or games can be
loaded from any active device or CMD partition,
the date and time can be displayed to the screen,
and more. RAMLink Manager offers ten different
time-saving functions. By pressing <F1> you
switch to the C-128, 80-column mode; <F2>
switches back to 64 mode. <F5> is entitled
“Programs”, and pressing it starts File Managerin
64 mode. From File Manager's menus you can
select the program you would like to launch.
Programs may be loaded from any active devices
and/or CMD partitions. The remaining seven
functions within RAMLink Manager are available

Volume 1, Number 2

to be defined by the user.

Alex's File Manager is written in machine
language; if you know your way around ML, you
can alter this program as well. If not, you'll find
the program to be useful just the way itis.

File Manager is started either automatically
from RAMLink when the computer is turned on
in 40-column mode or from RAMLink Manager
in 80-column mode. The opening menu has five
options: BASIC, Programs, Parameters, Manager
and Info. The options are started by pressing the
corresponding number key. The Parameters
option allows you to change screen colors,
redefine the Function keys, insert text and
programs, and to save the parameters. This
option, along with the Manager option, are the
heart of the program. Here you can play with the
different features and customize the program to
your own likin;

Ifyou'researching the market fora well thought
out and uncomplicated autostart program for
your C-64/128, write to Alex for his shareware
masterpiece.

Austrians are proud of their contributions to
the arts. Rudi Sanda, another Viennese, can be
proud of his piece of art: RAMLink Commander,
Rudi is a post office official who has a passion for
details! This passion is evident in his
programming. RAMLink Commander is a
beautifully written autostart program (BASIC7.0)

20

for the C-128. It boasts a loader and new screen
fonts which were written in assembly language.

After configuring your RAMLink for use with
RAMLink Commander and starting the program,
you'll be faced with the commander screen. From
this screen you can start up to 18 functions or
programs; view date and time; and perform
diverse drive access using JiflyDOS commands.
In each of the eighteen available function or
program options, sub menus canbe programmed
into the option. If, for example, the option
RL/FD/HD.-Jobs is chosen, a sub menu appears
offering partition, directory, sub-directory and
other choices. fone ofthese options from thesub
menu is chosen, another sub menu appears
offering additional options! The program is
extremely powerful and versatile.

Programmers can alter the program or insert
command lines to suite their taste and needs. A
complete printout of the program's code is
supplied with this shareware program, so it's
easy to follow the program's logicand make your
own alterations.

Both Alex's and Rudi’s programs come with a
German handbook. Depending on the response
from Commodore users in the U.S., an English
program description may be releasedin the future,
The shareware fee for either program is $10.00
plus postage, and they are available from their
respective authors, listed below.

Alex Fiisi
Anton Dengler Gasse 22/5
A-1210, Vienna, Austria

Rudi Sanda

Otto Probststrasse 3/68/11
A-1100, Vienna, Austria

Commodore World

THE MOST POWERFUL DATABASE EVER

DEVELOPED FOR THE C-64 AND C-128

Superbase 64/128

Software
The Programmable Database for yi
Commodore" 128

Over 70,000 users worldwide

For years, Superbase has been the most powerful database
system available for Commodore 8-bit computers. Why?
Because not only can you access its commands from
menus, but you can also create your own custom Superbase
applications using the built-in programming language.
Superbase can also import and export data using standard
sequential files for easy portability with other applications.
Additionally, the C-128 version will load with, and pass
Macro commands to, the SuperScript word processor to
create a completely automated office system.

With its built-in programming language, Superbase is ideal
for custom applications such as invoicing, inventory,
Accounts Receivable, Accounts Payable or just about any
task you can think of. Superbase version 3.01 is available
on 5.25" or 3.5" disk formats, making it ideal for use with
CMD's FD-2000, FD-4000 and Commodore 1581 3.5" disk
drives, CMD Hard Drives and RAMLink.

So if you've been looking for a powerful, easy-to-use,
programmable database - look no further! Superbase is
back and ready to tackle the toughest job of all—keeping
you organized!

DON’T MISS THESE OTHER FINE PRODUCTS FROM THE MAKERS OF SUPERBASE

Superbase: The Book

Superscript 64/128

The final word on Superbase programming
techniques from getting started through advanced
programming techniques. This book is filled with a
plethora of hints, tips and practical examples.
Superbase: The Bookis required reading for anyone
already using Superbase as well as those who are
contemplating using this powerful program in the
future. This book is a rare find and quantities are
limited, so get your copy today!

SuperScript has everything your looking for in a
professional word processor. Its menu driven
command structure is easy-to-use and eliminates
the need for complicated commands. Superscript
includes professional style editing, spell checking,
calculator, row and column arithmetic and full mail
merge facilities. The phrase glossary allows you to
store entire passages of text or Macro commands
and recall them with a key stroke.

Available from

Creative Micro Designs, Inc.
P.O. Box 646
E. Longmeadow, MA 01028

Software Hut, Inc.
313 Henderson Dr.
Sharon Hills, PA 19079

Software Support International
2700 NE Andresen St., A-10
Vancouver, WA 98661

Volume 1, Number 2

21

Commodore World

INTERNET

— een

will differ from another's. Many companies that offeraccess
to the Internet claim that the Internet is the Information
Superllighway. Right now, however, no one knows how
the Information SuperHighway will comeabout—they
just know that it is coming
Why the uncertainty? The U.S. Government is
taking the position of encouraging businesses—
through special incentives—to create the data
highway. Hence the bureaucracy is out of the
Superligh creation business, yet there is
still a lot of uncertainty present. Many
companies are seeking alliances to
promote their own ideas for the
SuperHighw
using the term /nformation
SuperHighway as a buzz-word for

“It's been obvious for a long time that we must have an

information-superhighway network that is as accessible and

asopenandasdemocraticandasubiquitousas the telephone
network that will carry vast quantities of data quick!
- Vice President Al Gore.

What is the Internet? What does Information

SuperHighway mean? How will these affect 1
Are there any benefits to Commodore 8-bit users?

Read on for answers,

What is the Information
SuperHighway?

There’s been a lot of discussion over
exactly what the Information
Supertlighway
are saying they're already on the
Information SuperHighway. They
are and they aren't. One person's
definition of the SuperHighway

Other companies are

is, yet many companies

commercial

ation—yet many of

these companies are doing very
littletohelp promotetheactual
spread of information.

Volume 1, Number 2 22 Commodore World

Visions of the Information SuperHighway
abound, but what the highway is certain to hold
is the following:

- On demand movies (you watch, rent when
you want to watch).

- Expanded research queries (easily ask
whether rain was falling on a certain date in
acertain place, etc.)

ily pull up databases from various
governmentaland commercial sites with the
touch of a key.

Since the Information SuperHighway willbebuilt
because of businesses, it’s likely that electronic
shopping—for everything from computer
software to home appliances—will become an
integral part of the pathway.

How’s it going to be done?
There are a few possible scenarios currently
the Information
SuperHighway will be created. How quickly the
information can be transmitted, ease of access to
the highway, and cost are all important factors.
In fact, speed and cost of information transfer
will no doubt govern how the Information
SuperHighway is created.

The Internet (described in detail below) already
offers a lot of services that the Information
SuperHighway is probably going to offer.
Currently available through on-line services or
through educational orcommercial organizations
itprovidesawidearray ofservices. Ithas, however,
suffered recently from the large influx of
individuals beginning to just use it, Within the
scope of the Information SuperHighway, the

envisioned as to how

Internet as it currently exists would be unable to
handle the strain,

Cable hasalso been speculated on asthe means
of being the information carrier, Because of the
wide availability andthe enormousband-rangeit
offers, cable is an attractive choice. But because
cable doesn't have the capability of receiving
information from consumers in mostareas ofthe
U.S., cable companies are scrambling to develop
the methods and protocols to do this.

Another possible (though less likely) carrier
for the information is that of the telephone
he unlikelihood of this stems from

companies. |
the fact that current phone lines are prone to
suffer from static, and lack the bandwidth
necessary to carry full-time video and audio
realistically while performing other tasks.
Fiber-optics could help, but that technology is
currently used only between long-distance
locations—not between local subscribers.
Replacing all the lines will be prohibitively
expensive, and would take a lot of time.

What will probably happen

Although the Internet is very strong, it is lacking
in numerous areas—the primary one being the
ever-increasingslowdownasnewusersareadded.
In my view, cable television companies will be the
information carriers, as they already have the
existing bandwidth, wiring, and need to make
changes only at specific line points instead of
everywhere like the telephone companies. Due to
the available bandwidth it’s entirely likely that
telephones themselves [as they exist today] will
gradually fade to non-existence, with
communications being shunted through the wires
of the Information SuperHighway instead of the

Commercial On-line Services with Internet Access

There are numerous providers of access to the Internet. I've also listed to what
degree they support the Internet. Depending on your needs you may be
satisfied with just Internet mail. Remember, some of these On-line Services
offer their own menus, programs and message areas. Take a look at the
definitions box to see what the terms such as Gopher, Usenet News, etc., are.
Before you sign up for one ask yourself what your needs are and then look at

the services offered by each.

America Online: 1-800-827-6364 ext
8856; $9.95 monthly, $3.50 hourly. No
Telnet, FTP access. Does have
Gopher, Usenet News.
CompuServe: 1-800-848-8199, $8.95
monthly for unlimitied basic services,
$8 to $16/hr depending on speed.
Internet mail only.

Delphi: 1-800-695-4005; $10 monthly,
$4.00 hourly. Full Internet access.

Volume 1, Number 2

GEnie: 1-800-638-9636; $8.95 monthly
with 4 hrs free, $3 - $12.50 hourly. No
telnet access. Supports FTP via shell.
Internet mail access.

Prodigy: 1-800-776-3349; $14.95
monthly, $3.60 hourly. FTP, mail
access.

The WELL: 1-415-332-4335; $15
monthly, $2 hourly. FullInternetaccess.

23

Glossary

Definitions of some of the
terms you'll see used while
exploring the Internet

BBS - Standing for “Bulletin Board
System" this indicates a network or
service which can be accessed via
use ofamodem anda terminal program
on your computer.

Commercial Service Providers
- These systems are what might be
considered to be “commercial BBS's.”
They offer message bases and file
libraries covering a wide range of
subjects andinterests. In addition, they
offer more specialized services, such
as access to on-line stock information,
andairline reservations. Avastnumber
of users may access these services at
the same time.

E-Mail - Stands for “Electronic Mail”
and indicates messages that are left
onacomputer system for another user
to later read.

FTP - Stands for “File Transfer
Protocol” - This is a method whereby
Machine A can login to Machine B and
“get” certain files.

Gopher - Is a menued information
system that also supports obtaining
files, sounds, text, and graphics; sort
of a multimedia retrieval system.
Modem - Standing for “MOdulator
DEModulator’ it allows a computer to
communicate to another computer
over normal telephone lines,

News groups - Areas where
messages pertaining to a specific topic
can be read from or written to. These
are generally accessible by a large
group of people.

Telnet - A method that allows an
individual to gain access to another
computer for the purposes of getting
orsending information. Internet BBS's,
Games, and other services usually
work via Telnet.
Telecommunications - The
process of exchanging computer data
over the telephone lines,

Usenet News -Represents the vast
array of newsgroups available through
the Internet. Currently over 3000.

Commodore World

regular phones. For those of you without cable,
like myself, consider getting it soon.

On To The Internet
Getting back to the Internet, le
what it’s currently capable of, and what it may
offer to you.

Defining the Internet isn’t quite as easy as
explaining how it works, though phrases such as
‘controlled anarchy’ come to mind in trying to
think up something to describe this global
network.

ake a look at

INTERNET

Imagine one computer. Now, take that
computer and hook it to another. And then
another, and another and another and another
untilyou'reout ofbreath repeating “andanother.”
After you'veimagined all those computers linked
together to form one huge network, imagine iton
a global scale from Antarctica to the U.S. to New
Zealand to Austria to Switzerland to Russia to
Mexico to the Netherlands. This is the Internet.

With a network of this size there are numerous
services for practically any hobby or interest.
There are people to answer your questions;

Accessing The Internet: A Sample Session

‘The following is a sample FTP session showing how easy itis to get files. I've included comments
in parenthesis beside each of the commands I've made to better explain what I'm doing.

ftp ccnga.uwaterloo.ca_

(This is what I typed and how I connected:)

220 conga FTP server (Version 5.2 Thu Mar 31 16:31:53 EST 1994) ready.

Connected to CCNGA.UWATERLOO.CA.
Name

(CCNGA.UWATERLOO.CA:duck) : _anonymous_

(Now it wants me to enter aname.)
(Anonymous is fine on most systems)

331 Guest login ok, send ident as password.

Password:

(Here I gave it my email address)

230 Guest login ok, access restrictions apply.

FTP> _¢d pub_
250 CWD command successful.
FIP> _dir_

200 PORT command successful.

150 Opening ASCII mode data connection

total 5

drwxr-xr-x 22 184 0 512 Apr
drwxrwsrwt 2 0 0 1024 Apr
drwxr-xr-x 4 67 0 512 Jan
drwxr-xr-x 2 200 0 512 Mar
drwxr-xr-x 5 106 t) 512 Mar

226 Transfer complete.

(I want to go into the PUBlic directory)
(Let's see what's available)
for /bin/1s.

25
28

20:59
21:31
11 14:43
30 16:00
1 12:56

ebm
incoming
jpblack
xcgood
wireless

321 bytes received in 00:00:00.25 seconds

FTP> _cd chm_

250 CWD command successful.
FTP> _dir_

200 PORT command successful.

(Hmmm, the CBM directory looks good)

(Let’s do another directory to see what's available)

150 Opening ASCII mode data connection for /bin/1s.

total 97

=xw-r—r— 1 184 0 5331 Apr
drwxrwxrwx 23 184 0 512 Apr
epee

drwxr-xr-x 3 184 6 1024 Mar
drwxr-xr-x 4 184 0 1024 Apr
drwxr-xr-x 2 184 0 1024 Mar

226 Transfer complete.
1403 bytes received in 00:00:01.

(continued in sidebar on page 25)

Volume 1, Number 2

25
25

20:58
20:59

OOREADME
INCOMING

27 06:44
25 21:18
2 02:28

utill28
utiled
vic-20

37 seconds

24

mailinglists, and news-groups onan ever-growing
number of topics. Many systems also support
what is known as FTP or GOPHER, which allow
you to access their site to obtain programs.

For those of you already involved with
telecommunications and BBS'ing, the Internet is
similar to one large gigantic BBS with unlimited
time, numerous message areas and free
downloading.

Originally implemented in theearly’70sby the
Department of Defense to implement a system
that could transmit messages across the nation in
anational emergency, the Internet has grown by
leaps and bounds. Universities worked with the
Department of Defense on the project and they
have since used the Internet to provide a vast
array of educational resources. More recently,
commercial companies have placed themselves
on the Internet.

Because of the educational aspect of the
Internet, and because it’s governed by no single
body but by “organized chaos” (which works
surprisingly well), there exists several interesting
and unique areas on the Internet where items
such as a list of smiley faces can be found.

Smiley faces are a group of characters that
need to be looked at side-ways to see what they
are. Some common ones are:

+) (Grin)

+) (Smile)

+( (Frown)
8-0 (Shocked)

In addition to smiley faces (there's a large list of
them available) there's a “cow list” (similar to
smiley faces except for cows—yes, the Internet is
unique at times).

Mail on the Internet is called E-Mail, which
stands for Electronic Mail. Regular U.S. Mail is
often referred to as “Snail Mail” or “S-Mail",
because of the length of time it takes compared to
E-Mail. Typically a message from California to
Virginia should only take 10 minutes at most—
often times it arrives almost instantaneously. I've
had messages from someone in Australia in my
mail box only 5 seconds after being sent! With
mail you can communicate with people in other
states and countries; and the smiley faces above,
plus other expressions suchas *hugs* inasterisks

Commodore World

help to give the conversation a more “human”
feel, creating a form of personality punctuation.

Also available are what are known as News
Groups. These are areas where discussions
concerning a wide range of social, political,
science, computer and educational topics can be
carried on. Two groups for Commodore 64/128
users are comp.sys.cbm and comp.sys.binaries.

Comp.sys.cbm is the primary news group for
the Commodore 8-bitters and discussions cover
such topicsas help in diagnosing repair problems,
programming, individuals selling related items,
thelatest newsand rumors, anda whole lot more.

Comp.binaries.cbm is a news group that posts
programs and files of interest to the Commodore
8-bit community. These are first converted to
text from their binary equi
process called uuencoding,
be posted just like a message. Thus, a user can
‘capture’ this text and saveit, then convertit back
into a binary program through uudecoding.

With over 3000 topics to choose from in
addition to these two, it’s very easy to get hooked
on using the news-groups.

Another way of getting information is from
E-Mail servers, which are special programs that
will send files and/or messages to you
automatically. From Email servers you may
request certain files; catalogs of programs that
are available for request; send messages to be
distributed to other individuals, and subscribe
to mailing lists for news items.

‘The only E-mail Server specifically designed
for the Commodore computers is one run by the
author. Its major intents that of distributing the
free Commodore Hacking magazine as well as
programs thatarein the magazine. Toget helpon
how to use it, send a message to the author in the
following format:

To: duck@pembvax1.pembroke.edu
Subj: MAILSERV
Body of message: HELP

This specific mailserver is operated twice a day,
soyoushouldreceiveareply withinapproximately
12 hours. Please be sure to have a subject line of
“MAILSERV”.Ifanyoneknowsofany other Email
Servers existing for the Commodore computers
please let this author know (I'm interested!).

Volume 1, Number 2

INTERNET

FTP stands for File Transfer Protocols and is a
method of obtaining programs that are storedon
another system’scomputers. Thereare numerous
FTP sites out there in Internet land. One of the
best currently available for the Commodore
computers is operated by Craig Bru
cenga.uwaterloo.ca. There are literally mi
of files available for downloading via FTP.

Gopher is a fairly new method of obtaining
information on the Internet. It allows an
individual to followa series of menusto reach the
appropriatefile (or groups offiles) forthe subjects
the user isinterested in. Itlinks information from
many different computerstogetherinasomewhat
ordered method. If you wish to find something
‘on say, the latest speech by President Clinton,
then you'd probably look under government
agencies, then look under press rele;

es and

eventually through this process of narrowing
things down you'll find a list of his speeches.

Accessing Internet
Sounds great you say, but how do join up? There
are a number of Some colleges and
universities offer free Internet access to their
students and faculty, or chargea (hopefully small)
computing fee. Many commercial on-line services
providesome form of Internet access. Local BBS's
mayalso hook up tothe Internet—thisis typically
done for access to news groups and E-Mail.
Some of the commercial on-line services
providers are listed in a sidebar along with some
of the Internet services they provide. Which one
is best for you depends on what you want to use
the Internet for. Regardless of how you do it, I
highly recommend getting on the Internet!

Accessing The Internet: A Sample Session
(continued from page 24)

FTP> _cd util128_

250 CHD command successful.
FTP> _dir_

200 PORT command successful.

150 Opening ASCII mode data connection

(Ah, it listed a lot. Let’s look in UTIL128)
(And again a dir to see what's available)

for /bin/is.

total 511
1 184 0 57 Mar 2 03:35 OOREADME
2 184 0 512 May 5 1993 DISK
2 184 O 420 May 24 1992 cre32a
2 184 ° 1203 May 24 1992 crc32a.doc
2 184 0 3218 May 24 1992 cre32a.s
1 184 0 3072 Mar 23 1993 filetype.128
1 184 0 25389 Mar 9 18:42 1rr200.asm
1 184 0 25463 Mar 9 18:39 1rr200.doc
1 184 0 28917 Mar 14 17:31 1rr200.sfx
1 184 Oo 16679 Mar 9 18:41 1rr200.uua
1 184 0 22000 Jun 4 1993 zed-128-077.sfx
1 184 0 38193 Feb 18 1993 zed077.uua

226 Transfer complete.

2222 bytes received in 00:00:02.39 seconds

FTP> _binary_

200 Type set to I.
FIP> _get 1rr200.sfx_
200 PORT command successful.

(The LRR looks interesting. Let’s tell it we
want it in BINARY instead of ascii. Otherwise
it would mess up the transfer)

(Now we “get” the file)

150 Opening BINARY mode data connection for Irr200.sfx (28917 bytes).

226 Transfer complete.

(And tell the computer we're finished).

local: LRR200.SFX remote: 1rr200.sfx
28917 bytes received in 00:00:10.65 seconds
FIP> _exit_

221 Goodbye.

25

Commodore World

HARD Tips

OUR TOP HARDWARE EXPERT DETAILS SOME SIMPLE FIXES

Ly Mark Fellows

Almost everyone has had it happen at least once.
Nearly everyone has had it disappear
mysteriously, Ittends to reappear when you least
expect it, or at the worst possible time. Reminds
you of acne, doesn’t it? Fortunatel
computeris not likely to have skin problems, but
it can come down with a number of minor
‘illnesses’ that can be hard to diagnose and even
harder to repair. In thisissue we'll concentrateon
the sometimes deceiving problems related to the
Cartridge Port.

Whena Cartridge Port device(RAM expander,
utility or game cartridge, ete.) fails to work
properly, the first instinct is to blame the device
itself as being defe
under anty, you will probably call the
manufacturer and arrange to have the ‘defective’
unit replaced. If the manufacturer does not offer
any troubleshooting advice and simply agrees to
take the unit back, you are most likely in for a
surprisein thenearfuture. What kind of surprise?
Well, if your ‘defective’ unit is like most others
you will probably receive notification that the
unitwasnotreally defectiv In thisinstance,
most companies will send the same unit back to
you, and some will charge you for the return
postageand/ortheirtime toevaluate the perfectly
good device. In any case, you will most likely be
right back where you started - with a device that
does not work with your computer.

At CMD, we have found that over 90% of the
problems that users report with our Cartridge
Port devices (RAMLink, SwiftLink, SID) are
actually the fault of the computer and not the
device itself, Most computer-related problems
will cause one ormore of the followingsymptoms
to appear:

tive. If the device is covered

pical Symptoms: Device plugged into the
Cartridge Port does not work or works
intermittently; computer does not work with the
device plugged in; device causes computer to
reset, lockup, oractstrangely- generating garbage
orincorrect characters on the screen, and possibly
corrupting disks or files,

Volume 1, Number 2

‘The good news is that most of these problems
can be solved by the user if a few simple
troubleshooting procedures are applied. The
causes and corrective procedures we give you in
thi le apply to all Cartridge Port devices,
and should work regardless of the type of device
that you have.

Causes and Corrective Actions
1. Bent, loose or dirty Cartridge Port connector
contacts, Poor connections account for nearly all
Cartridge Port problems, The Cartridge Port
connections must make tight contact with the
device to ensure proper operation. A single bent
contact in the connector is enough to cause any
device to either fail completely or operate
intermittently. In any case, always good
practice to take a jewelers screwdriver and bend
all contacts on the connector slightly so that they
will make tighter contact with the device. Refer to
the diagram below:

Insert screwdriver behind
contacts in order to bend them
back into the proper position

The contacts in the computer's Cartridge Port
connector and in the device can (and should) be
ned using an electrical contact cleaner
able at Radio Shack stores and other
electronic supply houses. An aerosol type is best
for reaching the contacts inside the Cartridge
Port.

2. Weak or intermittent computer power supply. The
number two cause for all sorts of unexplained
computer problems. Occasionally, a faulty or old
and ‘tired’ C-64/128 power supply will be
adequate to power the computer by itself but will
not be able to provide enough power to operate
theadditional circuitry ofa cartridge port plug-in

26

device. Insuch cases, the easiest way to isolate the
problem is to try your computer with another
power supply,

Note: C-64’s and 64C’s were not designed to
power Commodore REU’s (1700, 1764, 1750)
without the help of a heavy-duty power supply,
whereastheC-128and 128D can handletheadded
load of the REU without the need for a beefed-up

supply.

3. Faulty ‘PLA’ (or other chip) in computer, An
otherwise healthy and properly functioning
computer may havea faulty chip that only affects
the operation of the Cartridge Port. The PLA is
almostalways the culpritin these cases. Ifpossible,
try your Cartridge Port device on another
computer to help isolate the problem,

Note: Determining which particular chip is at
fault may require the help of an experienced
technician, Replacing the faulty chip can also be
difficult for the average user as it may involve
soldering.

64/128 Cartridge Port Connector

4. Dirty or corroded computer power switch. A faulty
switch may not deliver adequate +5V power to
the Cartridge Port connector, thus affecting the
Cartridge Port device, Again, the best way to try
to isolate the problem is to try the device on
another computer.

Note: Determining whether or not the switch
is at fault may require some specialized
instruments. Werecommend you obtain the help
ofatechnician to troubleshoot at this level and to
replace the soldered-in power switch ifitisin fact
at fault.

Commodore World

i] ette te Sr ate Only $244.95

Fil Tri Grap bits Machine

FUN Ui | ep (FGq) 1S AH “ALL-IN-ONE” GRAPHICS
PROGRAM FOR 64. WHAT CAN BE CREATEO WITH Fom IS
ONLY LIA TED hy oun LUGAGINATION, | JUST A FEW EXAMPLES:

NEW! Commodore «=» IBM MS-DOS

File Transfer Service, Now Available.
Don't have a 1571, 1581, or FD-2000 drive? We can transfer most
word processing files for you. Price starts at $20 for one disk
{includes return shipping and disk.) Please, call or write for details

Big Blue Reader 128/64 - 4.1

Transfers word processing, text, ASCII, and Screen Code files between
64/128 and IBM PC compatible 360K 5.25" and 720K 3,5° disks.
Requires 1571/1581 or FD-2000/4000 Disk Drive.

Still only $44.95
Version 4.1 upgrade, send original BBR disk plus $18.

GEOS ACEH:
tonbuten i
FUN GRAPHICS MACHINE FULL KEYBOARD OVERLAY ---$3.50 EA
PLEASE STATE COMPUTER (C64, C128, Sx-64) OR C64 IS SHIPPED
GUM GRAPHICS MPRCHINE DEMO DISK, THIS 1S A PREVIEW OF

WHAT FUN GRAPHICS MACHINE 1S ALL fl ~-$2.00
FOLLOWING DISKS REQUIRE THE FULL ay VERSION OF Fon

Gm FONTS QUER SO FONTS AT 5 0

Bible Search 3.2

Entire Old & New Testament text, plus an Exhaustive
English Concordance on 7-1541/71 disks or 4-1581 disks;
700,000+ references. Includes: C64 & C128 programs.
Incredible five (5) second look-up time, per/word, per/disk,
KJV $39 | NIV $49 | KJV & NIV $75
"= Call or write for more information.

Also available Online Bible Search for IBM & Amiga!

MO HANDLING PER ORDER 0
mAIL ADD AOOLTIONRL AS FOLLOWS:

SORRY MO CHARGE CARDS

The FGM Connection, P.0.Box 2206, Roseburg, OR. 97470

FOR MORE INFORMATION CALL 503-673-2234

PLEASE ADD FOR
FORE IGM ORDERS:

NADA/ ME:
Tes Fa

‘Order by check, money order, or COD. US funds only.

*# FREE Bookrate shipping in US. No Credit Card orders.
Canada & Mexico add $4 S/H, Overseas add $10 S/H ($5 BBR)

SOGWAP Software @ (219)724-3900
115 Bellmont Road; Decatur, Indiana 46733

GAME STAR 1 - Brand new! MJ SONGSMITH - LOADSTAR’s own music
ght of the best games from JJ making program. With this deluxe mu
LOADSTAR #70 - #100). The f@ editor/player you can easily transcribe music from
Tenement, Stac sheet music or make up your own tunes.
Sherwood Open, Gems, Stea Songsmith comes with a slick 30-page manual and
Bomber, Eagle E : aker ¢ a jukebox player with eight tunes. $19.95
Circuitry. $9.95 (C: -64/128) Item 080825 (C-64/128) Item #069525

CARD STAR #1 - Brand new! Eight of Maurice fj JUST FOR FUN - Eight original games. There
Jones’ best card solitaire games. Klondike, Double or J are uae games, educational games , puzzle
Quits, Strategy, Captive Queens, Baroness, Golf, games that are just plain fun on this
Collins and Chameleon, $9.95 (C-64/128) Item sk, $9.95 re 64/128) Item #073525
#080925

Visa/Mastercard Discover & Amex Accepted!
GEOPOWER TOOLS - 19 Geos utilities: Calendar Credit card orders:*1-800-831-2694
Printer, Fast Format, Geo Fetch (grab any portion of a Questions: 1-318-221-8718
screen as a Photo Scrap), Phoenix (resurrect a Softdisk Publishing
trashcanned file), Programmer's Calculator are just a P.O. Box 30008, Shreveport, LA 71130-0008
few of the handy tools. Side Two is filled with Clip Art Domestic shipping $4.50.
(in Photo Album format) and fonts, $19.95 (C-64/128) International Shipping $10.00.
Item #080525 All funds in US dollars.

CWLS34

Volume 1, Number 2 27 Commodore World

800-638-3263 (9-5:30 EST) - Technical Suppo

413-525-0023 (1-5 EST)

‘HD-40, 42 MB (Limited Supply) serrveresesss $895.00
HD-40, 85 MB (Limited Supply) $495.00
HD-100, 170 MB (Special Edition) $595.00
HD-200, 245 MB (Special Edition) $695.00
HD-345 / 500 / 1000 $795 / $995 / $1295

FD-2000 (800K and 1.6 MB) 3179.95
FD-4000 (800K, 1.6 MB and 3.2 MB) $249.95
FD Real-Time-Ciock Option... ‘$20.00
Box of 10, High Density Disks (1,6MB) $14.95
Box of 10, Enhanced Density Disks (3.2 MB)... $40.00

JiffyDos

JIifyDOS C64/SX-64 System $49.95
sdityDOS G-128/128-D System $59.95
Additional Drive RO! $24.95

Miscellaneous Hardware
‘SID Symphony Stereo Cartridge $39.95
GeoCable Compatible Print Cable $29.00
2+1 Cartridge Port Expander " $45.00
MW-350 Printer Intortace w/8K Butter $60.00
MW-350 Printer Intortace (OK) $49.00
IEEE Flash! 64 IEEE Intertaco $90.00
Quicksilver 128 IEEE Interfaco $120.00
MD's C-1351 Compatible SmartMouso $49.95
Mouse Pad. $2.95

Samsung SP-2412 24-pin Epson-comp. Printer $199.00

1541-11 Disk Drive (returt, no Power Supply) ..... $89.00
154 1-II Disk Drivo (roturb, w/Power Supply... $109.00
©-64, C-64C Powor Supply (Repairable) $39.00
C-128 Power Supply (Repairable) $45.00
1581/1541-II Power Supply .... $25.00
CMD Unites... $24.95
slilyMMON-64 (ML Monitor) $19.95
Big Bluo Reador V4.10 (SOGWAP) $39.00
The Compression Kit (Mad Man) $39.00
CMD's C-1351 Compatible Smart Mouse jon... $49.95
GEOS 64 v2.0 $44,00
GEOS 128 v2.0 $49.00
‘g90Cale 64 oF gooFilo 64 $40,00
‘geoCale 128 oF gooFilo 128 $45.00
‘gooProgrammor $45,00
geoPublish $40.00
geoChart. $29.00
Desk Pack Plus $29.00
FONTPACK $25.00
Intornational FONTPACK sees $25,00
geoBASIC $20.00
BockorBASIC $20.00
RUN GEOS Companion $20.00
RUN GEOS Powor Pak | or II (Spocity) $20.00
gatoWay/64 or 128 (Spocity Vorsion) $29.95
Collotto Utilties (Handy Goos Utitias) $19.95
Perloct Print LO for GEOS (Lasor-tke output)... $49.95
‘geoMakeBoot (Makos Bootable copies) $12.95
‘geoShell V2.2 (CLI for GEOS) ses $24.95
Dweezils Greatost Hits (NowToole2,Stamp,Labelt28) $30.00
Supertasa - Tho Book $15.00
Anatomy of tho 1541 $12.00
C128 Computor Aided Design $12.00
Commodoro 64 Tricks and Tips $12.00
Graphics Book for the C-64 $12.00
Printer Book tor the CB $12.00
Ideas for Use on Your C-6 asses $12.00
Languages/Compilers
BASIC 64 Compilor (Abacus) $17.00
BASIC 128 Compiler (Abacus) $25.00
Bitz! 64 Compiler (Skyles) $30.00
Bitz! 128 Compilor (Skyles) $30.00
Cobol 64 (Abacus) $17.00
Fortran 64 (Abacus) $17.00
Pascal 64 (Abacus) $17.00

P.O. Box 646

CrneD

Volume 1, Number 2

East Longmeadow, MA 01028

RAMLink Power-Backed RAM
RAMLink with 0 MB RAMCard

RAMLink with 1 MB RAMCard

RAMLink with 4 MB RAMCard
Real-Timo-Clock for RAMCard (Optional)
RAMLink Battory Back-up (Optional)

Paraltol Cable (RAMLink to HO)

AcroJot $12.00
Airborne Ranger $16.00
Atomino $17.00
Ballistix $13.00
Blackjack Academy $12.00

ood Money $15.00
Chomp! $10.00
Conflict in Vietnam. $16.00

eee ao
Laser Squad $13.00
Mainframe $13.00
Marble Madness: $13.00
roo He
Rings of Medusa $16.00
ence a
icone ae
Laren con
me oo ap
marie ae sen
Ultima III or V (Please Specity) $17.00
ted a
a
Tax Pertect 128 $79.00
eee aa a
Pockot Writor 3 (64 or 128) (Digital Sol) $70.00
Pocket Planner 2 of Pocket Filer 2 $35.00
‘SuperScript 64 (Precision) $15.00
‘SuperScript 128 (Precision) $20.00
epee lite ae
‘Suberbase 64 Version 3.01 (Precision) $35.00
‘Superbase 126 Version 3.01 (Precision) $35.00
PowerPian 64 (Abacus) $16.00
‘SwiftCalc 64 (Timeworks) $16.00
Cadpak 64 (Abacus) $22.00
Cadpak 128 (Abacus) $25.00
Chartpak 64 (Abacus) $17.00
Chartpak 128 (Abacus) $25.00
1 Paint v1.5 (128, 60-col,, 64K VOC) (Living Proof) .... $39.00,
| Port v1.54 (128, 80-co1,, 64K VDC) (Living Proof) ... $29.00
RUN Productivity Pak |, lI. of Ill (Specity) $15.00
Bi see Oe A
eae ae
Dialogue 128 $29.00
apr =
ilinre errr mere
‘SwiftLink Modem Cable (089-0825) $9.95
Commodore 1660 Modem (300 baud) $10.00
Some eee a
eee

BOCA 14.4K Baud Modem
BOCA 14.4K wiSwiftLink & Cable

Music/MIDI Software

Dr. T KCS64 & MIDI Intortaco ‘$150.00
Dr. T KCS128 & MIDI Intertace $189,00
Dr. T Algorithmic Composer $20.00
Or. T4-OP MIDI EdLib $20.00
Or. T CZ-Rider MID} Ed/Lib. $20.00
Dr. TOX-7 MIDI Ed/Lib $20.00

Creative Micro Designs, Inc.

Info: (413) 525-0023
Fe (413) 525-0147

28

Increase Speed Up to 1500% while
retaining 100% compatibility

Ss speeas up Loaaing, saving, Verifying, Formatting and Reading/

Writing of Program, Sequential, User and Relative files unlike
cartridges which only speed up Loading and Saving of PRG files

* Built-in DOS Wedge plus 17 additional features including file
copier, text dump, printer toggle, and redefinable function keys
make using your computer easier and more convenient

* ROM upgrade installs easily into most computers and disk drives.
Supports C-64, 64C, SX-64, C-128, 128-D, 1541, 1541C, 1541-

11,1571, 1581 and more.
EDSeries
—
3.2 and 1.6 MB 3.5" Floppy Drives
The FD-2000 and FD-4000 disk drives utilize
today's latest 3.5 inch disk drive technology.
FD-2000's support 800K (1581 style) and
1.6 MB (High Density) formats, while the
FD-4000 also offers support for the 3.2 MB (Enhanced Density)
disk format. Fast and reliable, they support 1541, 1571 and 1581
style partitions, Native Mode partitioning and can actually read and
write 1581 disks. FD's feature built-in JifYDOS, SWAP button and
optional Real Time Clock. High capacity, speed and compatibility
make the FD right for every application, including GEOS.
Power-Backed Expandable REU
The fastest possible form of storage,
WS RAMLink provides instant access to files
and retains data while your computer is
turned off. Easy to use and expandable up
to 16 MB, RAMLink utilizes the same powerful operating system
found in CMD Hard Drives. Unlike Commodore REU's which are
compatible with less than 1% of commercial software, RAMLink
supports more than 80% of the commercial titles. RAMLink also
offers built-in JiffyYOOS Kernal, SWAP feature, reset button, enable/
disable switch, pass-thru port and RAM port for REU/GEORAM use.
RAMLink offers maximum speed, expandability and compatibility
with all types of software and hardware including GEOS.
HDSeries
SCSI Hard Drive for the C-64/128
HD Series Hard Drives are available in
capacities up to 1 GB, are fully partitionable,
and can emulate 1541, 1571, & 1581 disks
while Native partitions utilize MSDOS-style
subdirectories. HD's connect easily to the serial bus or parallel via
RAMLink. Includes built-in JitfyDOS, SWAP feature and RTC. HD's
offer superior compatibility with most commercial software including
BBS, Productivity and GEOS. And with new pricing, HD Series drives
offer the lowest cost per megabyte of any C64/128 storage device.
Shipping and Handling Charges
Use tho chart bolow to match your order subtotal with your shipping zono and method
ert | a
Order Subtotal Dey_| HLPR [canada | orion
001 51999 Sw] sm | sire | sc | e500 | $1500
200082009 Sw | som | sic | sac] e700 | s2000
oes s00 | 1000 | sa0c0 | ste00 | smn | so500
Manse S500 | sizc0 | sza0 | sio00 | sre00 | wa500
fsisoooseoave | $1000 | sra0o | s270n | 2x00 | s2000 | e000
fseoncosrea% | sis00| e200 | ssao0| 2700 | $2500 | son00
520000 s2000 | $2500 | ss000 | saz00 | $3500 | $20.00

{UPS C.OD- add $5.00 (US/PR ony)

Payment and Delivery: CMD accepts MC, Visa, Money Orders, COD and Personal
‘Checks. Personal Checks are hold for up to 3 weeks. Most items are stock, contact CMD
for current delivery schedules. Returns for merchandise credit only within 30 days with
prior authorizations, All prices and specifications are subject to change without notice.

Commodore World

the 2.

CAD Releases Revolutionary New Mouse

Hickory-Dickory-Dock, SmartMouse has got a Clock!

For years, Commodore set the standard with the 1351 Mouse. Now CMD has seta new standard
with the SmartMouse. Guaranteed 100% 1351 compatible, the SmartMouse does everything
the C-1351 does and more! This highly-intelligent, three button mouse includes a built-in
battery-backed Real-Time Clock, and a double-click feature for GEOS. Plus, it comes with a
complete set of utilities, including: Auto-exec for setting the GEOS clock, a utility for setting the
mouse clock from GEOS, and a easy-to-use utility to set the time and date from outside of
GEOS. In addition to new features, the SmartMouse's ergonomic design makes it lighter,
smoother and smaller than its outdated counterpart, So, if your old mouse is losing the rat-race,
get out of that trap with SmartMouse!

What Makes the SmartMouse the BEST C-64/128 Mouse Ever...

Three buttons means convenience! If you're a GEOS user, the
left button is configured as single click, the right as a handy
double click and the center button is the TURBO button. When
depressed, it doubles the speed at which the mouse moves
across the screen. Additionally, programmers can assign
their own functions to all three of the SmartMouse buttons,

Unlike other third party mice, the CMD SmartMouse uses the
same custom gate array chip as the Commodore C-1351
mouse. This guarantees 100% compatibility with existing
software and hardware.

Switches easily into joystick emulation mode on power-up by
holding down the right button.

CMD 2+1 Cartridge Port Expander

Previously produced by Skyles Electric Works and recently acquired by CMD, the 2+1 Cartridge Port
Expander provides two vertical and one horizontal expansion ports for the C64 and C128. Each port is
equipped with four individual switches to control the +5, GAME, EXROM and ROML signal lines for utmost
flexibility and compatibility. This tried and true system has been helping Commodore users get the most from
their computers for years. For extra safety, the 2+1 is fuse protected and provides a convenient reset switch.

The 2+1 is great for using SwiftLink, SID Symphony, Super Snapshot, REU's, GEORAM or almost any other
cartridge that you may have. By using the 2+1, you eliminate wear and tear on your computer's cartridge
port caused by frequent use. Contact CMD for more information regarding compatibility and applications for

+1 cartridge.

* SmartMouse utilizes the same advanced mouse technology
used in today's powerful 486 and Pentium-based PC's, providing
you with unparalleled accuracy and smoothness of operation,

* Built-in battery-backed Real-Time Clock automatically sets the
GEOS clock, displays time and can be used in your own programs.

* SmartMouseis supplied with utilities disk and detailed manual
explaining the utilities and programming information.

* Attention Lefties! You're going love the SmartMouse! With a
simple modification outlined in the manual, you can alter the
SmartMouse for left handed use. (Or for a small fee CMD will
customize your mouse for you).

Built-in Configuration RAM allows for future enhancements.

CMD Specials

CMD Power Packages

Best prices ever! Save up to $125

Includes: CMD HD, RAMLink, RAMCard w/RTC, 1 or
4 MB SIMM, RL Battery, Parallel Cable
HD-40 w/RL1 $625 w/RL4 $745
HD-85 w/RL1 $700 w/RL4 $820
HD-170 w/RL1 $800 w/RL4 $900
HD-245 w/RL1 $875 w/RL4 $1000
HD-345 w/RL1 $975 w/RL4 $1100

Abacus Books

Great Prices on Great Reference Materials

Tricks and Tips for the C-64 $12.00
Ideas for Use on your C-64 $12.00
Printer Book for the C-64 $12.00
The Graphics Book for the C-64 $12.00
C-128 Computer Aided Design $12.00

Volume 1, Number 2

29

FD -2000/4000 Specials

FREE Copy of CMD Utilities
Buy an FD-2000 or FD-4000 with RTC, mention

this ad, and get a copy of CMD Utilities
absolutely FREE!

RAMLink Special

FREE Real-Time-Clock

Buy a 7 MB or 4 MB RAMLink w/ Battery and
we'll give you the Real-Time Clock FREE!

Hard Drive Special
FREE Copy of CMD Utilities or JiffyDOS

Buy any HD Series Hard Drive and get a
JiffyDOS Kernal ROM for your computer or a copy
of CMD Utilities !

Commodore World

i Paint

C-128 80-column interlaced graphics drawing program

T Paint, version 1.5, by Rick Kane;
Living Proof, Ltd,, P.O. Box
Minneapolis, MN 55408-8714

Graphics capabilities play an
important role in the world of
computers, and software author

Rick Kane proves that the

capabilities of our much loved
Commodore computers are almost
endless. Imagine having access to
4,000 colors from a possible 65,536
colors! Imagine a resolution of 640
X 400 pixels! And last, though
certainly not least, imagine being
able to use these capabilities with
your very own, low cost,
Commodore computer! Living
Proof, LTD., presents | Paint; a
graph ist's dream come true!
1 Paint requires a Commodore
128D or a Commodore 128
upgraded to 64K of video RAM, a
graphics printer(ifyouwantto print
your creation), a 1351-compatible
mouse, a 1541 or 1571 compatible
disk drive, and a RGBI color or 80
column monochrome monitor.
Support is also provided for the
following periphe “ommodore
1581, CMD

and color printers
NX-1000 and NX-2400 color
printers and Okimate 10 and 20
printers.

Volume 1, Number 2

Interlaced Graphics?
In order to comprehend the I Paint
graphics program, you'll need to
understand the term “interlaced
graphics”. A standard non-
interlaced video image is comprised
of two fields. Each field contains
horizontal scan lines, one field
containing data while the
other field remains
blank.

This
results in a
graphics display witha resolution of
640 X 200 pixels. However, in an
interlaced graphics video image,
both fields contain data, The sean
lines of one field appear between the
scan lines of the second field,
producinga combined resolution of
640 X 400 pixels.

this additional resolution
doesn't come without side effects—
interlaced graphics produce a
flickering effect on your screen,
Flicker is a result of the first set of
scan lines fading out as the second
setareinterlaced, Fortunately, there
are ways to lessen the effect. The
1 Paint manual suggests wearing a
pair ol . However, if you

ng!
feel bit silly doing this, the method
I use is to work in monochrome
mode until I actually need to work
with the colors for my creation,

Getting Started

1 Paint required approximately 4
minutes to load on my 1571 disk
drive, but it was certainly worth the
wait. The title screen gives a fine

example of the available color and
34D graphic possibilities. I Paint’s
main screen appeared after
completion of the loading

process. The screen

conte

strip
of icons (a
graphical menu)

above a large white block
which is your work area, You'll
needtoselectadrawingtoolto begin
drawing. | Paint provides three
different drawing tools—a pen, a
brush, and a spray can. Selecting a
drawing tool isas easy as pointing to
your choice and clicking a mouse
button. Once you've chosen your
preferences you'll be whisked into
I Paint’s work area. Drawing is as
easy as moving the transparent
arrow tothedesiredareaand clicking,
the “ON” button on your mouse.
‘The arrow then d
may begin drawing by moving your
mouse. To lift your drawing tool
from the paper click the “OFF”
button on your mouse. The arrow
reappears allowing movement to a

appears and you

newareain thework space, A second
click on the “OFF” button returns
you to the menu,

Options

1 Paint’s options are too numerous
to discuss at length here, so I will
move on to a few of the more

interesting options. | had fun
experimenting with all of the
availablecolorsin the Palette feature.
Acclick on the Palette icon reveals a
submenu forselecting colors. Paint

30

refers to
the foreground
colors as “INK”, and to
the background colors as
“PAPER”. Now remember that
interlaced graphics make use ofboth
fields of scan lines. So, what this
means to you is color for a
foreground (or background) can be
placed in both of these fields
resulting in a wide variety of colors!

The Text option was another
feature I enjoyed testing. The text
option provides a selection of six
fonts, plus the system font, plus a
loadable custom font. Selecting the
System Font grants the use of the
Commodore Uppercase and
Graphics character sets. 1 Paint
possesses some very potent text
possibilities. Text may flowin one of
any four directions. You simply

select the direction you wish for the
text to advance and type. It's as easy
as that. The text may be re-sized by
pressing the “ON” button while in
the drawing screen. Doing so
generates a “sizing box” in the work
he text is sized by dragging
this “sizing box” to the desired
dimensions. I Paint provides some
pretty powerful priority options for
use with text. One of these features,
the “WITH” option, allows text to
be superimposed on top of the
current image creating a 3-D effect,
Afewoftheothertext options permit
text to be underlined, flipped,
reflected, rotated, unrotated,
colored, and reversed. The function
y even be redefined as

Commodore World

i Port

C-128 graphics conversion utility

I Port, version 1.54, by Rick Kane;
$29.95; Living Proof, Ltd., P.O. Box
80714, Minneapolis, MN55408-8714

Living Proof, Ltd., compliments the
I Paint program with I Port, a
graphics manager program which
can be used to convert graphics files
for cross-platform compatibility or
for editing.

Port-Ability
1 Port is every bit as powerful as it's
counterpart as it grants the user the
ability toimport Amiga IFF, KOALA,
GIF, MACPAINT, GEOPAINT,
BASIC 8, uncompressed DOODL
and PRINT SHOP graphic file
convert any of these to
I Paint format; and export I Paint
imagesas GIF (Graphics Interchange
Format) files.
1 Port's main menu is very
straightforward, The menu li
eightavailableimport options
as the export option. A selection is
made simply by scrolling down the
menuand highlighting a choice and
hitting the return key. The

1 Paint (continuted)

suitable macros for those creations
requiring repetitive lines of text.

Packed with Power
All of I Paint’s options blend
together to form a very powerful
graphics program. But that's notall!
Author Rick Kane has included
several significant file features as
well, The LOAD feature permits

Volume 1, Number 2

appropriate conversion module is
loaded once a graphics format has
been selected.

A graphics file must first be
opened before it may be imported
into | Paint. By switching the
monitorto 40 column mode, Doodle
graphics files may be viewed as they
are loaded. A color table is provided
allowing the colors used by Paint to
be compared to the colors used by
Doodle, Color tables are also
provided for use with GEOPAINT
files. Amiga IFF and GIF colors are
adjusted with I Port's powerful
Palette Equalizer, The Palette
I zer permits the redness and
brightness of colors to be adjusted
by entering numbers for degrees for
grey, color, and bright color. Once
the equalizer settings have been set
they can even be saved to disk for
future use.

A Cut and Paste feature may be
used with Doodle pictures, allowing
any size portions ofthe Doodle’s320
X 200 source screen to be cut and
carried over to I Port's 640 X 400
destination screen. | Portalsoallows

BASIC 8 and LACE
be loaded into I
opening up a whole new world of
opportunities. Patterns and Clips
can also be stored and loaded for
future use. With the SAVE feature,
1 Paint pictures can even be i
in a Lacemaker format for use with
emaker 128 - The Interlace
Utilities Workshop”.

Of course, after the picture has
been saved to disk, hard copy isa

31

youtoadjust the
width and
height of Amiga IFF
and GIF images.

After the imported
file has been altered
to satisfaction, it’s
sily transformed
into an I Paint file by selecting the
Save I Paint option. Once this has
been accomplished, it maybeloaded
into I Paint and modified the same
as any other | Paint file,

1 Port's export option transforms
any I Paint picture into a GIF file,
Author Rick Kane has thoughtfully
provided five levels of compression

forsaving GIF files to disk, A value of

one will produce the largest file but
will save the file in the shortest
amount of time. On the other hand,
a value of five creates the smallest
file but requires a much longer
he GIF export
feature provides the user with

conversion time,

endless possibilities as files in the
PAINT,
BASIC 8, KOALA, DOODLE, and
PRINT SHOP formats may all be

must. | Paint's printing fe:
enable you to specify a print density
as well as a height specification,
though the ability to employ these
features is dependent upon the
capabilities of your printer,

Rick Kane began the | Paint
project in the sammer of 1988, and
has continued to improve and
support the program since its
release. Onecan clearly see that alot
of thought has been placed into this

BASIC 8

converted into the
I Paint format and then to the
popular GIF format,

All of the above listed features
createa powerful companion forthe
I Paint program. I Port comes
complete with documentation
which can easily fit into the 1 Paint
I. The addition ofa few more
examples and details pertaining to
I Port'scoloreditingfeatureswould
help the novice user tremendously.
But the manual is sufficient to allow
users to be up and running with all
of | Port's other features. I Port, in
combination with I Paint, present
Commodore 128 users with an
almost unlimited resource of
powerful graphic tools.

- Sherry Freedline

manua

program, | Paint even provides for
right and left handed mouse users.
The Setup Menu allows the mouse
to be customized to the user’sliking.
The manual packaged with I Paintis
a very nice spiral bound booklet.
The documentation goes into great
detail with all of the many available
options. | Paint is an asset to the
novice, as well as the skilled
computer artist.

- Sherry Freedline

Commodore World

VIEW

SmartMouse

C-128 80-column interlaced graphics drawing program

SmartMouse; $49.95; Creative
Designs, Inc., P.O. Box 64
Longmeadow MA 01028,

You know, I've written a lot of

reviews over the last few years, for
both RUN Magazine and for
Compute. The first review I ever
wrote was of Gateway, Creati
Micro Designs’ file
software for GEOS. Since then,
reviewed a number of other CMD
productsand written several articles
about using CMD's RAM devices. I
may be no ace programmer and I'm
certainly no technical wizard, but I
feellikeI'm pretty competent towrite
aboutyet another of Creative Micro's
products, the SmartMouse.

But this review is different from
the others I've written. It’s is being
writtennot for RUN orforCompute,
but for Commodore World, a
magazine put out by Creative Micro
Designs itself. In other words, I'm
being paid by CMD to writea review
ofone oftheir own products, Sounds.
pretty fishy, doesn’tit? Kind oflikea
conflict of interest.

But no, I'm not planning to step:
down, thank you very much. After
all, I need my paychecks, same as
anyone (maybe more). I also need
themouse, butmoreabout thatlater.
Idid worry alittle that readers might
not take this review seriously under
the circumstances. So what I am
planning to do is give a good, solid
review, pulling no punches and
telling it straight, even ifthat means
biting the hand that feeds mea little
bit. To be honest, that's the only

Volume 1, Number 2

kind ofreview that CMD would want
me to write, anyway.

Missing Mice...

That said, let's get on with it; let's
talk about the mouse for the
Commodore computer. As many of
you know, lately there hasn't been
anything to talk about in that
department. There simply was no
mouse available for the Commodore
64 or 128, and that was that. The
1351 and the M3 were no longer
being made and all supplies were
soon depleted, Wouldn't you know
it, my trusty 1351 went belly up on
me shortly thereafter, leaving me
back in joystick mode. For a GEOS
aficionado like me, that was sheer
misery.

Now let’s face it, the Commodore
market isn’t exactly booming these
days. When Tenex and others sold
the last of their stock of 1351's and
most Commodore users
figured that spelled the end of the
64/128 mouse. They weren't
figuring on CMD, which stepped in
and saved the day. The SmartMouse
has} nd forme, it
came in the nick of time. 1 was
delighted when the package from
CMD showed up on my doorstep.
The box contained the three-button
mouse, a disk of utilities (slightly
bent), and a manual.

st been released,

Looking Smart

The SmartMouse is about two-
thirds the size of my old 1351, andis
light gray in color (my 1351 ismore
of a light beige). When I took it out

of the box, I was immediately
impressed with the way itfelt
in my hand: solid and
heavy, like it was built to
last. The three buttons
depress with a firm
click, adding to the
impression of quality
construction, This is
definitely not a cheap
mouse.

Test Drive

1 first tried the
SmartMouse with GEOS, using
the 1351 input driver | already had.
The mouse worked beautifully,
gliding effortlessly around the
mouse pad, luseditin geoWriteand
geoPaint and was very pleased with
the smooth motion and the
comfortable feel. Again | realized
that this was definitely not a cheap
mouse.

After spending an enjoyable time
messing around in geoPaint and
then playing solitaire, 1 figured it
was time to get serious: | opened the
manual. As is usually the case with
CMD products, the documentation
was very complete and easy to
understand. All the various features
ofthe mouse are carefully described.
I discovered, for example, that new
and improved GEOS mouse drivers
made specifically for the
SmartMouse were included, and the
documentation clearly explains how
to install them onaGEOS boot disk.

1 followed the installation
instructions and switched to using
thenew 128 driver, whichisincluded

32

along with the 64 version on the
. Once I had done this,
several additional functions were
available to me as | cruised around
GEOS. The right mouse button now
“double-clicked” with only one press
ofthe button. I discovered that [had
to make that one click just a little
slowerthan usual forthe doubleclick
tohappen, but once! gotthe hang of
it] started to find lots of uses for that
easy double-click besides just
opening files on the deskTop. Using,
it on the brush tool in geoPaint, for
example, neatly brings up the brush
selection box.

‘The middle button, a first for any
Commodore mouse, has been
programmed with those new GEOS
drivers to activate something called
“turbo mode.” In “turbo mode” the
pointer zipsacrossthescreen almost
instantly, which is very handy when
you need to, say, set margins first on
one side and then way across on the
other side of a page in geoWrite.

Commodore World

SmartMouse (continued)

As if that weren't enough to earn
this mouse its name, it also includes
areal-time, battery-backed clock. By
including a simple autoexec file on
your GEOS boot disk, you can
automatically set your GEOS clock
everytimeyoubootup. Theprogram
you need is included on the disk, of
course, and fullinstructionsforusing
it are included in the manual.

Compatibility

The manual claims that the
SmartMouseis fully compatible with
any software that supported the
1351 mouse. Sol left GEOS to check
out that claim, There aren't many
programs besides GEOS which
support the mouse, but there are a
few. 1dug out my copy of FlexiDraw,
which supports not only thejoystick

and mouse but also the Koala Pad
andlightpenas well. Ifound thatthe
program worked just fine with the
SmartMouse.

In order to use the SmartMouse
with other software packages, I had
to switch the mouse into joystick
mode by holding the right button
down while booting up the
computer. In this mode, I used the
SmartMouse to draw in Doodle,
which makes that program much
more fun to use, in my opinion. |
also played a few events of Summer
Games, but I discovered that for
games like that a joystick is actually
a better choice. Then I broke out my
stack of shareware disks and started
playing various games, Every single
one worked perfectly with the
mouse. Some, like Summer Games,
were easier to play using the joystick

itself, but that’s not the fault of the
mouse.

Besides the GEOS utilities on the
disk that comes with the mouse,
there are several other goodies, One
is RUN Paint, a full-featured paint
program which nicely supports the
mouse. This program gives a user
plenty of graphics power and it’s
included free on the disk. A simple
but well-designed clock-setting
utility is also included.

If you are the hacker type who
understands things like “command
bytebitassignments,” you'rein luck.
The manual provides all the
information you need to access and
command the inner workings of the
SmartMouse yourself. A number of
mouse driver routines are included
on the disk, ready to be used in your
own programs to support the

SmartMouse. Left-handed userscan
adjust the SmartMouse to work in
reverse of the standard mode (the
right button becomes the left and so
on). This procedure is outlined very
clearly in the manual along with a
picture.

Allin all, the SmartMouse from
Creative Micro Designs is an
excellent product. It is well
constructed and performs very
smoothly, The documentation is
very understandable and extensive.
The utilities disk provides GEOS
support, programming support, and
even RUN Paint. Even if there were
more than one mouse around to
from, 1 would still
recommend the SmartMouse.

And, no, CMD isn’t just making
me say so,

choose

~ Steve Vander Ark

Chomp!

(Cosmi)

Great sharks alive—it’s Chomp from
Cosmi!Chomp places youin the role
ofa fish where you must master the
art of survival in a world swarming
with voracious aquatic creatures.

Life begins in a fish bowl
environment free of predators. In
the fish bowl you must feed on
worms as they are disbursed from
the decorative castle. It’s not as easy
asitsoundsasthewormswill provide
you with a challenge by swimming
atoddangles. Lack of food willshrink
you down in size until you are too
small to survive, Another key factor
to survival is to keep yourself in
motion to provide yourself with an
adequate supply of oxygen. Lack of
oxygen will turn you blue and
eventually result in death.

Youwill eventually increasein size
‘once you have consumed enough
worms. Youarenow ready to venture
into the tank next door. To travel to
theadjacent aquarium makea quick
run for the top of your fish bowl and
jump into the neighboring
aquarium. Your new home will
provide you with a larger

Volume 1, Number 2

MINIVIEWS

dy Commodore World Staff Reviewer Sherry Preedline

environment containing predators
and prey of various sizes. You are
now able to devour fish and insects
alongwith worms. But keepin mind,
you are also prey! For kicks you may
want to venture to the top of your
aquarium where you will be quickly
scooped up by a giant cat paw. The
screen will then change to allow you
towatch as your life “flushes” before
your very eyes. Each successive level
in Chomp takes you to a new and
bigger water world fullofeven bigger
opponents.

Chomp requires a joystick for
gameplay. Yourfishswimssmoothly
and responds rapidly to your
requests. Your adventure is
accompanied by a very fitting
suspenseful tune. You will find the
graphics quite captivating from
viewing a bony blue fish to the ever
unforgettable shark!

Chomp is one of those games for
youngand old alike. Each successive
level in Chomp takes you to a new
and bigger water world full of even
bigger opponents. You'll findithard
to tear yourself away from this
underwater world.

The Three Stooges
(Cinemaware)

The Cinemaware Corporation has
done an outstanding job of bringing
the Three Stooges to life in a game
for the Commodore 64, The
introduction to the game is truly a
spectacular graphics delight as you
are treated toa richly detailed frame
straight out ofoneofthemany Three
Stooges film shorts. Cinemaware has
topped the game off with a fantastic
assortment of di d speech and
sound effects including my all time
favorite “nyuk, nyuk, nyuk!”

The opening screen reveals our
beloved Stooges out for a stroll in
Stoogeville. Upon hearing a
urbing sound, they rush to
investigate the origin. The trio
discover Ma sobbing in despair over
the fact she must produce $5,000 in
thirty daysto prevent foreclosureon
her orphanage by the evil banker,
Mr. I. Fleecem. The Stooges vow to
help Maraise the fundsandthegame
begins! The gameresemblesa board
game as the threesome stroll along
Stoogeville’s one-way street
accommodating 180 locations.
Larry, Curly, and Moe wander

33

through town working in various
off-the-wall positions including:
boxing, piethrowing, crackereating,
‘a, hospital racing, and slapping.
My favorite event was a toss-up
between guiding the Stooges
throughacrowdedhospitalcorridor
inmidget racecarsand participating
in a pie tossing brawl at a very
eloquent dinner affair. If you're a
very skilled Stooge-a-maniac you
may even earn enough money to
marry the Stooges off to Ma's lovely
daughters Mary, Leona, and
Cynthia!

TheThree Stooges Movierequires
the use of a joystick. A little practice
time may be required to master
control of the joy . The manual
packaged with the game provides a
fascinating history of the Three
Stooges. Cinemaware did an
excellent job of fashioning the game
inthestyle ofa typical Three Stooges
filmshort. Fachevent is heaped with
laughs resulting from various
digitized speech clips and sound
effects acquired directly from their
film shorts. This is one game Three
Stooges fans coitainly cannot do
without!

Commodore World

Graphic Interpretation

by Stove Vander Arh

A FUNNY THING HAPPENS TO STEVE ON HIS WAY TO WRITING HIS COLUMN

When the editor of this magazine asked me to
write a column about GEOS, I’m sure he was
expecting something very solid and no-nonsense
from me—something useful, ifyou will. Afterall,
GEOSis without a doubt the premier productivity
package for the Commodore 64 and 128
computers. Whatever type of work you need to
get done, there's probably a way to do it easier
with GEOS, And work is serious stuff.

So in this column I'll be talking about things
like better ways togeoPublish andthe bestadd-on
programs for geoWrite. I'll try to give you a first
glimpse ofall the most powerful andefficientnew
GEOS products that come along (of which there
are a lot more than you might think). In other
words, I'll make sure things stay solid and
no-nonsense. Thisis GEOS, not The Muppet Print
Kit, for Pete's sake.

To get things off to a rousing start, I've been
poking around in my drawer full of disks which
hold all the hundreds of GEOS programs I've
accumulated from Q-Link and GEnie over the
years, I know there are a lot of great shareware
and public domain programs in there that make
working in the GEOS environment extremely
efficient and productive. I checked some disks I
haven't looked at for quite a while, and T was
gratified to see plenty ofinteresting applications,
desk accessories, and so on to choose from. Ialso
found, tucked away on a back page, something
called Yahtzee.

Ofcourse I recognized that name; Ilove Yahtzee
(the kind with real dice). | honestly couldn't
remember if!'d ever played this GEOS version, so
[figured it wouldn't hurt to give it a try. After all,
Thad plenty of time to get down to business and
start working on this column. As it turned out,
this version of Yahtzee is really quite good. |

Volume 1, Number 2

played it a few times (and since it’s a two player
game only, each game was really sort of like two
games, so it took a while) and then decided to
copy it to my RAMLnk so I could play it some
more later. | also uploaded a copy of the file to
GEnie, just in case anyone else likes Yahtzee too.
It’s file number is 14783.

On the same disk where I found Yahtzee, I
foundalittlegame called geoNim. Ido remember
playing that game before and seem to remember
not likingit particularly well. couldn'tremember
why, so I played it again a few times. I was right,
Idon'tlikeit very much; it didn’tseem to bemuch
of a challenge, although it was designed well
enough. But the game seems kind of pointless
and the computer a pretty dumb opponent (or
maybe I'm just really, really clever, I guess).

There are lots of better games around. A good
example is Blackjack. I'm talking, ofcourse, about
the Blackjack that comes on the DESKPACK Plus
disk (available through most GEOS dealers). That
version is especially nice because it’s a desk
accessory, which means I can play it whenever I

34

feel like it, even when I should be writing this
column, which is what I'm really supposed to be
doing rightnow. But since I'm thinking ofit, [just
copied it over to my RAMLink so that I'll be able
to play a few hands if | need a break. And [also
tested it a few times, just to make sure it’s as cool
as | remembered. It is.

‘There is another desk accessory game that I
like called Skeet, which was originally a type-in
program in Compute’s Gazette and which they
released on their GEOS Collection disk. Skeet is a
(surprise) skeet shooting simulation. I copied it
over to my RAMLink too so that I'd have a few
choices of desk accessory games. I had a feeling
that Skeet wouldn't be very easy to play now that
my mouse is defunct and I'm back to doing
everything with a joystick; I was right. I only
played that one a couple of times.

In that same pile, which is set aside for
commercial disks (see how organized I am?) 1
found my copies of the RUN GEOS Power Pack
disks and GEOS Companion (all available from
CMD). I knew of several games on those disks,
including Breakout, but decided I shouldn't let
myself start playing those or I'd never get this
column written. I settled for just a few practice
rounds of my favorite GEOS game, geoTiles. This
jewel of a game is found on GEOS Power Pack 2,
and I think it’s worth the price of the whole disk
all by itself.

I had forgotten just how many GEOS games
there actually are. I haven't even mentioned
geoWar or Cluster Wars or any of the card games
like Solo Poker, all of which I haven’t played in
ages! I guess the serious work can wait until my
next column. Check back then and'll talk about
something no-nonsense and efficient. For now, T
think I'll play geoTiles a few more times.

Commodore World

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Volume 1, Number 2

LOR 64 BBS

THE COLOR 64 BBS SYSTEM, one of the most sophisticated BBS
systems for the Commodore 64 computer, has always been built to
be functional when first installed yet completely modifyable by the
SYSOP. Now we are proud to announce the release of version 8.0,
the latest form of the BBS system that is popular with both beginner
and advanced Sysops.

In its stock form Color 64 supports: 300 to 2400 BPS; up to 38,400
BPS with CMD's SwiftLink; Hayes compatible modems; Commo-
dore or compatible disk drives; CMD HD Series, Lt. Kernal and ICT
hard drives; IEEE drives; Commodore REU's up to 2 MB; CMD's
RAMLink and MORE. A minimum of 1300 blocks of disk space is
recommended as well as some form of disk drive speed enhance-
ment such as CMD's JiffyDOS, Skyles Flash Interface or fastloader,
Color 64 also features: upload and download directories; Punter and
Xmodem protocols; an advanced public message system; a full
featured message editor; built-in MCI commands for message
formatting; 40 and 80 column support; an automatic page pauser;
Commodore graphics and color; ANSI graphics and color; Built-in
terminal program with phone book; Built-in networking with net-
worked mail, public messages, and file transfers.

More information about Color 64 BBS can be obtained by contacting
the SYSOP of the Sonic Temple BBS at 410-285-0428, You can also
send GEnie mail to F.OGLE, Inet/Usenet mail to

F.OGLE@GENIE.GEIS.COM or U.S. Mail to Fred Ogle, P.O, Box
35427, Dundalk, MD 21222-7427, Send all orders via Mail.

Pricing for Color 64 Version 8.0, a four disk set with documentation:
the costis $65.00, Postage/handling charges: US Mail 3rd Class add
$2.00 (Surface), US Mail 1st class(Air) add $3.00, Priority Mail (2nd
Day) add $4.00, Express Mail (Next Day) add $15.00. U.S. funds
only, checks or money orders accepted. Canadian orders add $5.00.
Prices and features are as of 3/13/94 and are subject to change.

Computer Bargain Store

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or Call (801) 466-8084 (4-7 PM MST)

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with Keyboard . $ 195.00
with Keyboard & Manual
with Keyboard, Manual and 8/9 Switch
with Keyboard, Man., 8/9 and JiffyDOS
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27 Double sided Stereo SID disks
14 Double sided GEOS Picture Disk: ‘ 3
17 Double sided C64 Art and Demo Disks .... $21.00

1409 Mill Street Laramie, Wyoming 82070

35 Commodore World

deo? rogrammist

By Maurice Randall

Before getting too deep into GEOS programming,
I must emphasize the importance of obtaining
one or both of the following publications: The
Official GEOS Programmer's Reference Manual,
and The Hitchhike juide To GEOS (both of
these are available from CMD). Each of these
works contain information about the GEOS
system that is invaluable to the programmer. On
asmall scale, you can get by with just one or the
other; the serious programmer, however, should
haveboth. The manual that came with your copy
of GeoProgrammer is quite thick, and even
though it contains a good deal of information,
the bulk of it is devoted to the actual use of the
applications, geoAssembler, geoLinker, and
geoDebugger.

For the time being, open up your manual and
study chapters 3 and 4. This will give you a basic
understanding of how to mble and link a
GEOS program. Now, let's dig right in and work
ona very simple application.

Begin by copying the two files, SamSeqHdr
and SamSeq.Ink, from your geoProgrammer disk
to a work disk or your RAM disk. You alwa
need a *Hdr file and a *.Ink file. The header
(*Hdr) file contains the information that, when
assembled, will make up the 256 byte block that
is considered the header block of a GEOS file.
This is where the Desktop looks when you select
‘info’ from the file drop-down menu. The link
(*.Ink)fileis needed by geoLinker. It contains the
info needed to properly link your assembled
source codeintoa usable application. Ifyoustudy
the contents of these files, you will see parts that
you may alter for your own purpose. In the *.Ink
file, you would change the filenames to match the
files that you are working on. For now, let's keep

Volume 1, Number 2

it simple and use these files just as they are.

What we must do nowiscreate the source code
for our‘program’. Instead of copying the SamSeq
file, we will refer to it while we write our own
version of it. So, on your work disk, use geoWrite
to create a file called SamSeq. Get into the habit
of making your source code organized and easy
toread by setting up tabstoseparate the element:
that make up each line instead of using spa
I've found that on an 80 column display, tabs at 1
7 inches work pretty good.
Fora40columndisplay, something like .Sinches,
1.5 inches, and 3 or 3.2 inches is better. You'll
want to avoid having to scroll side to side if you
can.

On the first page of this source code, typein the
following:

.include geosSym
-psect

‘The geosSym file contains many symbols that

36

refer to various parts of GEOS for use in your own
programming. The symbol ‘EnterDesktop’ is
defined in this file.

Press <RETURN> a couple of times and add a
label to your program code, perhaps ProgStart,
as it is in the actual SamSeq file. Even a small
application needs to start out with a label—
geoProgrammer doesn’t seem to like it if you
leave this out. The .psect tells geoProgrammer
that the code following from this point is to be
assembled torun beginning with thecurrent value
of the program counter. In other words, this is a
‘program section’ of code. We will get into this a
little later.

At this point in the operation of your
application, it will be in control of the machine.
‘The ideal situation is for your application to just
do what it needs to doand then put GEOS and the
userbackin control. Ifyou have written programs
for the native mode of your computer, you know
what happens when your program ends with an
‘rts’. Your program ends and control is returned
to the user. Thisis not the case with GEOS. Ifyou
want your program to end, you need to jump toa
routine called ‘EnterDesktop’. Remember that
we are working with a point and click
environment. Built within the GEOS Kernal are
many routines that have already been written for
us. There isa great deal of programming already
done that we can avoid including in our own
programming.

Ifyou think you are ending your application
with an‘rts’, youare returning control to the user
and to GEOS, but your application is still in use.
At this point, the GEOS Kernal is watching for
some sort of user response, either from the
keyboard or the mouse. If the user performs an

Commodore World

“GEOS WwatTCHES FOR AN ‘EVENT’ TO
HAPPEN, AND RESPONDS ACCORDINGLY .
Iv’S A NICE WAY TO DO THINGS.”

will respond by reentering your application.
This portion of G 5 running is called ‘MainLoop', Normally,
outside of GEOS, you would have to have your own main loop and include
the needed programming to catch the user’s input. Instead, all that is
needed here are lookup tables for MainLoop to look at when it gets a
response from the user. Iftherearenolookup tables, then nothing happens,
GEOS ignores the user's actions and the user gets the fecling that the
computer has just locked up.

Ifyour application simply performs a job and finishes, you can end it by
jumping to EnterDesktop. Butifyou need some user input, such as clicking
onicons or menus, you will need to tell GEOS where to find the appropriate
lookup tables before you get to that first rts.

When your program gives control to MainLoop, the user might click the
mouse. There is one thing you must keep in mind here. GEOS will look for
anicon table. Ifit does not find one, there will be problems. It doesn't seem
to mind if there is no table for menus, but you need to at least provide an
icon table even if your application is not going to use icons. This only
applies if you return to MainLoop with an rts. If you exit back to the
Desktop instead of MainLoop, the user doesn’t get control of the mouse
anyway andlikewise, MainLoop will never get control while your application
is running. It all depends on what your application is going to accomplish.
Ifyouneed user input, youricon table can define an icon that does not exist.
This way GEOS won't havea problem. I'll show you how to do that ata later
date.

In the SamSeq file supplied with geoProgrammer, you will find an icon
table. It will begin with a label called ‘IconTable’, This particular table
consists of 9 lines. Copy this into the sample file that we are building here.
You might want to put it on page 2 to keep it out of the way. Create another
label after this table called ‘Icon1Picture’ just like in the SamSeq file.
Following this will go a photo scrap of whatever icon you wish to use. So,
load up geoPaint and create a graphic of some sort. Copy it into a photo
scrap and then paste that scrap into your source code after the label
‘Icon 1 Picture’, One thing you must remember here is to always puta blank
line above and below any photo scrap you put in your source code, so do
that now. This insures that geoAssembler knows the exact
the graphic, Can you imagine having to code this graphic into your source
code manually? This is pretty handy isn’t it?

Within the icon table, we need to tell GEOS how wide and how tall the
icon is, Here again, geoAssembler will figure this out for us. As soon as it
processes the photo scrap it will place these values into two of it's own
internal variables, which are called picW and pic, From within your
source code, you have access to these variables and can copy these values
into your own symbols. This is normally done in your source code
immediately following the photo scrap. So, type in the same thing as in the
SamSeq file, or cut it to a text scrap and then paste it in your own file. Since
you are including ICONIWIDTH =picW and ICONIHEIGHT =picH,

Volume 1, Number 2

art and end of

37

whatever values are contained in picW and picH will be in your symbols,
You will finda reference to th
get these values to show up in your icon table,

In this icon table, find the reference to Doleon1. s the name of the
routine that GEOS will jsr to when the user clicks on your icon, For our
purpose, let’s change this to EnterDesktop. This way, when the user clicks
on your icon, your application will simply end,

Let's go back to page 1 and build a little bit of code at the start of our
application now. Later on, I will get into the use of macros with
geoProgrammer. And you will find that you really can’t live without them,
It makes your coding so much easier. For right now, we will do without
them for demonstration purposes. Anyway, use your tabs and type in the
following code:

symbols in the icon table. This is how you

ProgStart:
Ida = #[IconTable
sta $82
Ida = #) IconTable
sta $82+1
jsr Dolcons
rts

‘That is the extent of our little application here. This along with the icon
table, the icon picture, and the header block, is all of the code that will be
assembled and linked. Load up geoAssembler and assemble SamSeqHdr
and your new SamSegq file. Then load geoLinker and link the resulting .rel
files together by selecting the file called SamSeq.Ink. If everything goes
good, you will have a finished application that you can load and run from
the deskTop.

What our code does here is to point the required zero page register to our
icon table and call a GEOS Kernal routine known as Dolcon
is usually referred to as r@, and after this we will ab
into this ata later date also. Dolcons will do a couple of things for us. It will
first set up a pointer within the GEOS Kernal so that MainLoop knows
where tofind ouricon table. Then it will perform the job ofdrawing ouricon
on the screen, Following this it returns to our application, In our case, we
just do an rts now and let MainLoop take over and give control to the user.

The user now has full control of the mouse and the keyboard. There is
really only one thing that GEOS will let the user do at this point. We did not
tell GEOS that we are looking for keyboard input and we did not inform it
ofany menus either, But we did define one icon, As soon as the user cli
on this icon, GEOS will close out our application and reload the desk Top.

Our icon could have just as easily told GEOS to access another routine
within our application. This is how GEOS works, and is called ‘event
programming’. GEOS watches for an ‘event’ to happen, and responds
accordingly. It's a nice way to do things.

Commodore World

SASic

INSTINCTS

by Gene Barher

When Doug Cottonasked me to expand BigGuns
into a large game that would span across the
ing five issues for this year, I was a little
skeptical. Afterall, Big Guns was a fictional game
we put together to illustrate sound programming
practices, In fact Doug had to use some of that
Editor-Columnist arm twisting in order to
convince me to create the new game. After
ngon this forsometime, Ifinally recognized
the value of creatingsucha column. mustadmit,
our editor here at Commodore World hada great
idea and | believe that through these columns we
are going to learn a great deal about
programming. Even better, we're going to have
fun doing it! Below you will find the results ofour
efforts.

1 the first of five installments of the new
game Starship Combat. Starship Combat is
written entirely in Commodore BASIC v2. We
will focus heavily on structured program
development so that we can become better
programmers. Although this column is designed
forbeginning BASICprogrammers, even thoseof
you who are experienced may want to review
some of the advanced techniques utilized by
Starship Combat’s subroutines,

we

The Game
Starship Combat has the ability for two sets of
forces (the Union and the Alliance) to duke it out

spec
forces and the player controls the U:
The battlefield is a (10) by (10) grid of sectors for
atotal of(100)sectors. Only onesectorisdisplayed
on thescreenatany one time. Each sectorisa(10)
by (10) grid of characters, Each ship has its own
letter (A-Z) to represent it in a sector; so we may
have up to (26) ships in the game at any one time.
Combat will be limited to the current sector for
each ship; a ship may only attack other ships that
are in the same sector. A ship can be destroyed in
two ways: when its superstructure fails or when
the ship runs out of power. The game is over
when an entire side has been destroyed, In this
installment of Starship Combat we will
concentrate on the following:

= Setup the game screen

Volume 1, Number 2

- Design our text system (where and how we
will output game text)

- Setup the game's main loop

~ Create the movement system for the ships
Design a simple routine to guide the
computer's ships

Before we begin to type madly at the keyboard,
we must design Starship Combat on paper. Inthe
long run this method will save us a great deal of
time. Wewillcreatethe program Starship Combat
in three steps:

(1) Outline main logic
(2) Design data structures (our variable types)
(3). Write the program

Outline Main Logic

Let's write out how Starship Combat will work in
a simple format so that we will have some idea of
how to approach this project in BASIC.

Initialize all Union and Alliance ships
While the Union ships are alive;
Initialize the movement points for all the ships
While ships still have movement points;
process ship with most movement points
End_While
End_While

The outline above will help us keep focusedas we
develop Starship Combat’s code.

Design Data Structures

First and foremost, we need away to representall
the ships in the game. The most convenient way
to do this in Commodore BASIC is to use a two-
dimensional array. We will call this array SL% for
Ship List. The array will contain a record for each
ship. Each ship has a number SH for SHip which
will tell us where it is located in the array. A ship
record will contain the following information:

SLM(SH,0) Ship type:

[0]- Union Scout

(1]-Union Light Destroyer
[2] - Alliance Hunter

[3] - Alliance Light Destroyer

SL%(SH,1) Sector number where ship is

38

located [0-99]

X Coordinate of ship's location in
the current sector [0-9]

Y Coordinate of ship's location in
the current sector [0-9]

‘SL%(SH,2)

SL%(SH,3)

SL4(SH,4) Current number of movement
points available [n]
SL%(SH,5) — Amount of power remaining in

the ship's reserves [n]

‘The “%" following the array name tells BASIC
that all the ay are
integers. We'll use an integer array since integers
use less than half the memory of real numbers
(integers require two bytes per number and reals
require five).

In the outline we created above, we wrote that
we must init all the ships before the start of
the game and we must initialize all the ships
movement pointsatthe beginning of each round.
In this installment of Starship Combat we have
four ship types (0-3). Each ship typeis defined by
its name, available movement points per round,
and its default power supply, Since the name is
character string AND the movement points and
the power supply are integers, we must use two
separate arrays to represent them. We will name
the arrays TY$ and TY% for ship TYpes. The first
array will be just a list of the ship names; so it will
only require one dimension.

ues contained in the

TY$(0) UN Scout

TYS(1) UN L-Dest

TYS$(2) AL Hunter

TYS(3)_ ALL-Dest

The“$" following thearray name tells BASIC that

all the values contained in the array are strings.
Our second array will require more than one
number for each ship; so it will require two
dimensions where:

TY%(X,0) Available movement points per
round
TY%(X.1) Default power supply level

“X" is the ship type (0-3). In the program listing
youwill find that we reference this array using the
ship type entry in the SL% array. For example,

Commodore World

TY%(SL%(SH,4),0) tells us the number of
movement points that the ship SH in the game
has per round,

Ourlast data structure will address our need to
accept several different keyboard commands for
the players options in the main menu. We will
createanother one-dimensional array named OP$
for OPtions which will contain each of the
command characters.

OPS) @ ~~ Move ship up
OPS): Move ship left
OPS(2)_ ; Move ship right
OP$(3)_ / ~~ Move ship down
OPS(4)_ uu Use an item

OPS(5)_ Effect repairs on ship

Wait one turn

Quit the game

Fire ship's phasers
Fire ship’s torpedoes

OPS(6) w
OP$(7) q
OPS(8) [FI]
OPS(9)_ [F3]

Write The Program
Now that we have our outlineand data structures
designed let's hit the keyboard!

As you type in the program make sure you
review each section's comments below. This will
help you understand the flow of the program.
You will also find a couple of helpful notes and
insights which you might find useful in the future.

IMPORTANT VARIABLES

NT Number of ship types available

UT — Number of union ship types available
(union ship types must be first in the TY
arrays)
Used to detect whether a ship is from the
Union or Alliance

TY$ — Ship type name array

TY% Ship type statistics array (movement
points and power supply)

NS Number of ships that are alive

SL% — The ship list array containing the current
status of each ship

OP — Number of options available in main
menu

OP$ Array of possible command characters

SA$ Initialization string for status area

OAS _ Initialization string for options area

NAS _ Initialization string for notes area

SH Current ship

MP — Movement pointsavailable forthe current
ship

PW Power supply for the current ship

XX X coordinate for current ship

XY Y coordinate for current ship

XZ Sector number for the current ship

Volume 1, Number 2

MAIN PROGRAM DESCRIPTION

Lines 100-199 (setup main game loop)

- Call the setup screen routine

- Call the initialize game variables routine

Lines 200-299 (main loop for the game)

- Follow structure of our outline using calls to

subroutines

Lines 215 and 220 perform our first While by

cycling through all ships in the ship list SL%

until it finds a Union ship type

Line 225 calls the initialize all ships for next

round routine and frees up any unused strings

using the FRE function (this will help us avoid

a lengthy garbage collection delay caused by

our use of strings)

Lines 230-250 finds the ship with the most

movement points ble

- Lines 255-260 calls either the process Union
ship or process Alliance ship routine

Lines 400-460 (all union ships are destroyed)

- Tellplayerall Union shipshave been destroyed

- Ask player if he/she wishes to play again

SUBROUTINE DESCRIPTIONS

Lines 10000-10199 (setup screen)

- Set screen colors and select the lowercase
character set

- Print the main game screen

Lines 10200-10299 (print repeated ch string)

Given: XS$ - the string; XS - the number of

repetitions

- This routine prints the string XSS, XS times

Lines 10400-10699 (initialize game variables)

- Lines 400-499 sets up the ship type arrays TYS
and TY%

~ Lines 500-570 sets up the main ship list array

SL% placing three Union ships in sector (22)

and four Alliance ships in sector (33)

Lines 575-600 creates the strings SAS, OAS,

and NAS which point to top left hand corner of

the Status, Options, and Notes text area on the

game screen

~ Lines 605-630 sets up the command character
array OPS for the main options menu

Lines 11000-11199 (initialize all ships for next

round)

- Cycles through all the shipsin the ship list and
resets their movement points

Lines 11200-11299 (clear notes area and set the

cursor)

~ Fills the notes area with spaces

~ Sets cursor color and position for the notes
dfea

Lines 11300-11399 (clear options area and set

the cursor)

39

- Fills the options area with spaces

~ Sets cursor color and position for the options
area

Lines 11400-11699 (update status and map area

for current ship)

Given: SH-the ship number; MP - ship's current

number of movement points

- Lines 400-499 prints the ship's stats in the
status area

- Lines 500-599 updates the sector in the map

rea for the current ship

- Using screen memory which starts at 1024, the
formulas place the shipsat their properlocation
in the map area (through the use of the POKE
command)

Lines 11700-11799 (print integer)

Given: XN-theinteg themaximum length

of the integer in characters

- This routine converts the integer to a string,
removes the leading space from that string,
pads the remaining string with spaces, then
prints the string (using the MID$ function)

Lines 11800-11999 (kill ship)

Given: XK - the ship number to kill

- Informs player of ship's destruction

- Removes ship from ship list SL% and moves all

with higher numbers than XK down one
position in the ship list

Lines 20000-24999 (process union ship turn)

Given: SH - Union ship number; MP - ship's

movement points

- Lines 000-030 Updates status and map areas
for the ship

- Lines 035-070 Prints the main menu in the

options area

Lines 075-199 Gets the command character

from the keyboard and goes to its respective

routine

Lines 200-999 Ex

commands.

Lines 25000-29999 (process alliance ship turn)

Given: SH - Alliance ship number; MP - ship's

movement points

- Lines 000-030 Updates status and map areas
for the ship

- Lines 035-999 Close in on the closest Union
ship

shij

cute the respective

(See the program listing on the following pages)

A Note Concerning Program Entry
Large program listings appearing in
Commodore World magazine are
accompanied by a list of checksum values to
theleft ofeach line. Donotenter these valuesas
part ofthe program. The values can be verified
using the Commodore World CHK-LIST
utility, located elsewhere in this issue.

Commodore World

5000
6DC2
cé67Cc
8589
OE6B

DA6B
28AF

3806

D18B
3D73

9B57
6D6F
F25c
548B

5E73

STARSHIP COMBAT

195 rem commodore world magazine
119 rem basic instincts w/gene barker
115 rem starship combat part i

rem (c)1994 creative micro designs

rem-

rem setup main game loop

rem-

gosub10000:clr

gosub10400

rem-~

rem main loop

210 rem-

215 fori=Otons-1:ifsl%(i,@)<utthen225
next :goto4@o
+ gosub11000
: sh=999:m
: fori=Otons-1

: if61%(i,4)>mpthensh=i:mp=s18(i,4

i=fre(@)

: next
250 : ifsh=999then200
255 : ifsl%(sh,) <utthengosub20000:goto2

260 : gosub25000:goto230

400 rem-

495 rem all union ships are destroyed
410 rem-

415 gosub11200

429 print"All Union ships have been dest
royed."

425 gosub11300

430 print"Game over."

435 printoa$"{2 CRSR DN}Try again?"
44 printoa$"{4 CRSR DN} (y)yes"

445 printoa$"{5 CRSR DN} (n)no"

450 getx: £x$="n"thenend

455 ifx$<>"y*then450

460 run

LDOOD or era 5 rae aaa aad
10005 rem setup screen

106010 rem

10915 rem sets up screen for the game
LOD 2 on a a aaa
10025 rem-

19030 rem set screen colors & ch set
10035 rem-

10045 poke53280,0:poke53281,0

10050 printchrs(14)

10055 rem-

1996 rem print the screen

10065 rem-

10970 print” {CLR/HOME} {DGRY}"; :xs=39:xsS
="{CMDR @}":gosub1@200:print

10075 print"{RVS ON} {SPACE} {WHT} Commodor
e World's Starship Combat {4 SPACES) {DGRY
} {SPACE)*

1008 xs$="{CMDR t}":gosub10200:print
10085 print"{CRSR RT}{YEL}{RVS ON}Status
“spe (5) "Map"spe (8) "Options {DGRY)"

10090 xs$="{CMDR @}*:gosub10200:print
10095 xs=10:xs$="{RVS ON} {SPACE} {LGRY} {1
@ SPACES} {DGRY} {SPACE} {WHT} - -{DG
RY} {SPACE} {LGRY}{15 SPACES} {DGRY} {SPACE)
"+chrs (13)

10100 gosub10200

19105 xs=39:xs$="{CMDR t}":gosub10200:pr
int

Volume 1, Number 2

STARSHIP COMBAT (c

19110 print"{CRSR RT}{RVS ON} {YEL}Notes{
DGRY}"
19115 xs$="{CMDR @}":gosub10200:print
10120 print"{RVS ON}"; :xs=6:xs$="{SPACE}
{CRSR DN} {(CRSR L}":gosub1@200
10125 print"{RVS OFF}";:xs=39:xs$=" {CMDR
t}":gosub10200
10130 print"{RVS ON}";:xs=6:xs$="{CRSR U
P}{CRSR L}{SPACE}":gosub10200
19135 print"{HOME}{6 CRSR DN}{CRSR RT}{L
GRY}"; :xs=10:xs$="{SHFT *}":gosub10200:p
rint
1014@ print"{2 CRSR RT}{RVS ON}Move:"
10145 print"(CRSR RT}{RVS ON} Power
10150 print"{2 CRSR RT){RVS ON)}Shid:"
19155 print"{CRSR RT}{RVS ON}Super:"
print"{2 CRSR RT}(RVS ON)Torp:"
print"{CRSR RT}{RVS ON}";:gosub1d¢2
@O:print
print"{2 CRSR RT){RVS ON}Sect:"
print"{3 CRSR RT) (RVS ON)Pos:{SPAC

return
print repeat ch string

xs$ - ch string
- # of repeats

forxi=ltoxs:printxs$; :next:return
rem=
rem initialize game variables

rem setup ship definitions
rem-
nt=4:ut=2
dimty$(nt-1),ty%(nt-1,2)
forxi=@tont-1:readty$ (xi) :forj=Oto
l:readty% (xi,j) :next:next
19445 Gata “UN Scout",3,500
1045@ data "UN L-Dest",4,750
10455 data “AL Hunter",3,480
19460 data “AL L-Dest",4,725
10500 rem-
10505 rem setup ship list
10510 rem-
19515 ns=7:dims1%(ns-1,5)
10520 forxi=Otons-1
10525 : forxj=@to3:reads1%(xi,xj) :next
10530 : sl%(xi,5)=ty%(sl%(xi,®) ,1)
19535 next
10540 data 1,22,4,5
10545 data 0,22,2,7
10550 data @,22,6,7
19555 data 2,33,3,3
9
5
7

10560 data 2,33,3,

10565 data 3,33,5,

10570 data 3,33,5,

10575 rem-

10580 rem setup string variables

10585 rem-

10590 sa$="{HOME}{5 CRSR DN}{CRSR RT) {RV
S ON} (LGRY}"

10595 oa$="{HOME}{5 CRSR DN}{23 CRSR RT}
{RVS ON} {LGRY}"

10600 na$="{HOME}{18 CRSR DN}{CRSR RT}{R
VS OFF) {WHT}"

10605 rem-

19610 rem setup option ch's

Commodore World

STARSHIP COMBAT (cori

S11E
8FDA

A560

AETS
1BF5
33c5
E750
E794
5FB7
6B4D
AC92
O7E6
1E7B
138B
67AF
8495
F339
B7D1

72DC
4637
54BB
FL7B
8011
ppc?

@B97

1A34
2660

EA76

62BD

DIED
@6BE
cc5A
6AE1

A4FO
C536
ccs7
43B9
7F14
30F3

43FF
1p64

Volume 1, Number 2

10615
10620

rem=
op=10:dimop$ (op-1) : forxi=@toop-1:r

eadop$ (xi) :next

10625

Qn {FL},

10630
11000
11005
11010
11015
11020
11025
11030
11035
11290
11205
11210
11215
11220
11225

¥$ (13) :gosub1 0200

11230
11300
11395
11310
11315
11320
RY)";
11325

data "é",
“{F3}"
return
rem=-
rem initialize all ships for
rem next round

forxi=@tons-1
: 81%(xi,4)=ty$(s1%(xi,@) ,0)
next

rem clear notes area and set
rem the cursor

rem=
print" {HOME} {17 CRSR DN}"
%S=6:xS$="(CRSR RT}(37 SPACES) "+ch

printna$;:return
rem
rem clear options area and set
rem the cursor

rem
print"(HOME}{5 CRSR DN}{RVS ON) {LG

x8=10:xs$="{23 CRSR RT}{RVS ON} {15

SPACES}"+chr$ (13) :gosub10200

11339 printoa$;:return

SUL OND ce Ol test rn ns int ine md iets
11405 rem update status and map area
11410 rem for current ship

11415 rem

11420 rem sh - ship #

11425 rem mp - movement points

11430 rem=—A- = -n a= anne Rina ann n
11435 rem-

1144@ rem update ship's status

11445 rem-

1145@ printsa$;left$(ty$(sl%(sh,0))+"(8
SPACES)", 10)

11455 print"(RVS ON){CRSR DN)"spe(7);:xn

=81%(sh,4):

11460

xl=4:gosubl1700
print:print"{RVS ON)"spe(7);:xn=sl

%(sh,5): gosubl1700

11465
c(7) 53
11470

%(sh,2)

11475

print:print"{RVS ON) {4 eo DN} "sp
xn=s1%(sh,1) :gosub11700: rh
print:print"(RVS ON}" BpeUnG pixn=sl
:xl=1:gosub11700:xx=xn
print"(CRSR RT)";:xn=s1%(sh,3):

gos

ub11700:xy=xn

11560
11505
11510
11515

10:xs$="{12 CRSR RT} {RVS ON)

rem=
rem update map area

rem-

print" {HOME} {5 CRSR DN) {WHT}";:

+

chr$ (13) :gosub10200

11520

forxi=Otons-1:ifsl%(xi,1)<>xzthenn

ext :gotol1530

11525

xi,2),

11530

poke1O24+5*40+12+91% (xi, 3) *40+s1%(
xi+193 :next
xt=1024+5*40+12+xy*490+xx:pokext, pe

ek(xt)-128: return

117¢0
11705
11710
11715
11720

rem--
rem print integer

rem

rem xn - the integer

rem xl = max length of integer

165B

@OAL
B36C
1B06
8268
4A07
D1ip4
93FC
28DB
420A
9716

5A3D
FEEF
4504
2FB9
E70D
82BB

11725
11730

STARSHIP COMBAT (covil.)

printmids (str$(xn)+"({5 SPACES)",2

x1);

11735 return

11800 rem-

11805 rem kill ship

11810 rem

11815 rem xk - ship # to kill

11820 rem-

11825 x: 13 (xk, 2

11830 xt=12+5*4O+xx+xy*40:poke55296+xt , 2
spoke1024+xt,170

11835 gosub11200

1184@ print"Ship is destroyed!"

11845 rem-

1185@ rem update ship list

11855 rem-

11860 ifns=1then4go

11865 ns=ns-1;ifxk=nsthenreturn

1187@ forx k+ltons

11875 forxj=0to5;s1%(xi-1,xj)=sl%(xi,x
3) rnext

11880 next

11885 return

20000 rem=-------~--~--~~-~--~~~-----~~
20005 rem process union ship turn

2OO1LD) PEM — = ne
20015 rem-

20020 rem update status/map/options
20025 rem-

2003@ gosubi1490

20035 gosub11300

20040 print" (@,:,;,/)move"

20045 printoa$"{2 CRSR DN} (u)use item"
20050 printoa$"{3 CRSR DN) (r) repairs"
20055 printoa$"{4 CRSR DN) (w)wait"

20057 printoa$"{5 CRSR DN}(q)quit game"
20060 printoa$"{6 CRSR DN}(F1l]fire phase
x

20065 printoa$"{7 CRSR DN) (F3]fire torp*
20070 printoaS"{9 CRSR DN) (A-%)view ship
20075 rem-

20080 rem get option

20085 rem-

20090 getxx$:ifxxS=""then20090

20095 ifxx$>="A"andxx$<="Z"then20700
29100 pw=s1%(sh,5)

20105 forxi=ltoop:ifxx$<>op$ (xi-1)thenne
xt:goto2009o

20110 onxigoto20200, 20300, 20400, 20500, 20
990, 20090, 20800, 20600, 20090, 20090

20200 rem-

20205 rem move ship up

20210 rem-

20215 ifxy<>@thenxy=xy-1:goto20230
20220 if (xz-10) <@then20230

20225 xu=xz-10:xy=9

20230 rem-

20235 rem do the move

20240 rem-

20245 s1%(sh,1)=xz:s1%(sh,2)=xx:s1¢(sh,3
)=xy

20259 mp=mp-1:pw=pw-1

29255 rem-

20260 rem update stats

20265 rem-

20270 s1%(sh, 4) =mp:s1% (sh, 5)=pw

20275 gosub11400:ifpw=@thenxk=sh:gosub11

800

3B6A | 20280

gosub11200:return

41

Commodore World

STARSHIP COMBAT (cont.) STARSHIP COMBAT (cont,)

rem- B321] 25135 : ifxl>9thenxl=x1-10:yl=yl+1:goto2
vem move ship t

sl%(xi,1) :y2=0
2-10:y2=y2+1:goto2

20315
20320 i

thenxx
(str$(

1:goto20230
,1)="0"then20230

20325 xx=9:goto20230 : xl=abs (x2-x1) :yl=abs(y2-y1)
rem- Kt=xl+yl
rem move ship right ifxt<xdthenxp=xi :xd=xt :x3=x1:y3=
1:xn=s1%(xi,1)
Othe K=xX+1:G0t020230 next
ights$(s 9"then20230 ifxp=999then400
+1:xx ifx3>y3then25190

if (xz-xn) <@then20500
3 goto20200

20500 rem-
20505 rem move ship down

20510 rem- x1=xz:x2=xn
20515 ifxy<>9thenxy=xy+1:goto20230 ifxl>9thenxl=x1-10:
8 | 20520 if (xz+10)>99then20230 ifx2>9thenx2=x2-10:goto25200
‘ 20525 xz=xz+10:xy=0:goto20230 if (x1-x2)<@then20400
20600 rem- goto20300
rem quit game rem-

rem close on closest union ship

rem-

xp=999:xd=999

forxi=Otons-1
1£(s1%(xi,@)>=ut)or(s1%(xi,1)<>x

z) then25345

25330 : yx=xx-s1% (xi, 2) :yy=xy-s1% (xi, 3)

25335 : xt=abs (yy) :ifabs (yx) <xtthenxt=ab

s(yx)

25340 : ifxt<xdthenxp=:

rem-
5 gosub11300
print"Quit gam

466 20630
4 20635 px
40
20645
20650

R DN} (y)yes"
R DN} (n)no*
n"then20000

G=xt :2x=yx:zy=

rem view ship yy

rem 25345 next

sh=asc (xx$) -asc("A") 25350 ifabs (zx) >abs (zy) then25365
ifsh>=nsthenreturn 25355 : ifzy<Othen20500

25360 : goto20200
25365 ifzx<@then20400
25370 goto20300

mp=s1%(sh,4)

20730 gosub11400

20735 gosub11300

20749 print"View ship:"

20745 printoa$"(2 CRSR DN}(press a key)"
20750 g ex$:ifxxS=""then20750

ae 2 CW & RUN Back Issues
20800
20805 rem wait one turn

For years RUN Magazine provided Commodore Users

20810 rem- with a great source of information and now CMD has
AEP See Rea Ww-1:goto2@255 given you Commodore World. Don't let this valuable
pei 4 information slip away, fill in the voids in your library now!

RMJAN92 January/February 1992

2
aoe RUN Magazine [Pirie Marchi 1992
25020 rem update status/ma Aoat RMJAN88 January 1988 RMMAY92 May/June 1992
sate Zen, pda tatus/map/option MERHES February 1988 RMAULO? unAugust 992
25030 gosubl1490 RMMAR88 March 1988
ce See AMABRGG Apri 1988 RMNOV92 _ Nov/December 1992
25049 print"Alliance ship" RMMAY88 Yate Commodore World
25045 printoa$"{CRSR DN)closes!” RMJUN88 June 1988
25050 pw=s1%(sh,5) RMJUL88 July 1988 CW1-1 Volume 1, Number 1
25055 x RMFEB89 February 1989 CW1-2 Volume 1, Number 2
2596@ rem move towards a union ship RMMAY89 May 1989
25065 rem- RMJUN89 June 1989
25070 forxi<Otons-1:ifxi=shthen25080 RMJUL89 July 1989 RUN Back Issues: Any 3 issues for
25075 : if(sl% ,0) cut) and(s1%(xi,1)=xz RMAUG89 August 1989 $12.00; Any 6issues for $18.00; Any
)then25300 RMSEP89 September 1989 12 issues for $24.00.

6033 | 25080 next RMOCT89 October 1989 Commodore World: $4.95 each

780C | 25100 rem- RMSP89 _— Special Issue 1989

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83CE 5 xp=999:xd=999 RMJUN9O June/July 1990 Ganada $5.00, Foreign $15.00; 12

CEFT forxi=Otons~1

RMDEC90 December 1990 issues U.S. $5.00; Canada $7.00;
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Volume 1, Number 2 42 Commodore World

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Volume 1, Number 2

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2

43 Commodore World

ADVANCED
TECHNIQUES

by Doug Cotten

Last issue we began lookingat methods ofmaking ‘common code’ programs
that operate on both the C-64 and C-128. We generated a single line BASIC
program to‘snooparound’ and discover our configuration. [also presented
a brief list of things to consider when writing code of this type. In this
installment, we'll takea look at some specific ways to create these ‘common
code’ programs utilizing some of those considerations.

It bears repeating that this kind of programming will require input to be
performed on a 128—a C-64 simply doesn’t have the ability to recognize
BASIC 7.0 commands which will be used from time to time.

In looking over our ‘snooper’ line from last issue, | did notice an error
that crept in when the program was converted to text; the CHR§(127)at the
beginning of that program line should have been a CHRS(147). To make
sure these errors don’t happenin the future, I'm writing a program that will
handle the conversions without human intervention.

Here then is the corrected program line:

One of the main points I want to cover in this issue is dealing with a large
machine language written to run on both the C-64 and C-128. Normally,
when a machine language program is written specifically for the C-64 or
C-128, itis written to reside ina known location. Programmers often use a
separate loader program that loads the machine language into that fixed
location, or end up writing custom front-ends for programs each time they
make a new program, Having to keep separate files together in order to get
a program to work is not only annoying to a user, but it also brings other
problems into play—like how to handle device numbers, subdirectory
paths, etc, Granted, we all managed to live with old programs that had
device 8 hard-codedin, and had lots of little modules for sprites, screen, and
portions of the code itself. But I'd certainly like to see programmers today
step up and start making things easier to deal with for the end user.
Tcan‘t count how many times in the past I've been close to completing a
program, only torealize that] still had the task of writinga custom relocator
or front-end module ahead of me. It was out of a desire to do away with ‘the
job after the job’ that I began to experiment with creating a ‘one for

approach to this problem. The solution which I have been refining over
time involves sandwichinga relocatable machine language ‘mover’ routine
between a BASIC front end and the actual machine language program
itself, Because it is written in relocatable code, it doesn’t matter where in
memory it is located.

‘The purpose of this routine is to move the machine language program up
in memory if the computer it is being used on is a C-64. By moving it to
where it would normally be located on a C-128, we can keep from having to
write the entire machine language portion of the program in relocatable
code. We can also keep our SYS command locations common for both

Volume 1, Number 2

44

types of computers when writing the BASIC portion of our program.

‘There's one more part of this puzzle to solve, however. How do we know
where our relocating routine is? This, too, is fairly easy to overcome. Both
the 64 and 128 have pointers in zero page memory to tell us where BASIC
programs begin in memory. By using a BASIC routine to follow the line
links, we can quickly find the end of the current BASIC program. And, with
careful placement of our relocating routine, we'll know exactly where to
SYS to.

I might mention some other possible ways to utilize these methods.
While | intentionally designed this scheme as a way to start big machine
language programs, I found it could also be applied to smartly written
mixed BASIC and machine language programs. Using a number of small
machine language subroutines for speeding up certain aspects of a BASIC
program is something many of usas programmers have often done, or wish
to do more of. Writing your machine language subroutines in relocatable
code, and using the routines I'll be providing here, gives you the ability to
edit your BASIC code without having to re-link the machine language
routines. Your program can be loaded asa single entity, edited, and saved
again—completely intact.

But enough about why I find this approach appealing; let's get into the
code itself. Before we jump into the machine code portion, let's get the
BASIC part set to do what it needs to. Here's our ‘snooper’ program line
with the additional code we need:

ABS ( PEEK (65533)
(215)>127):T

686B 10 PRINTCHRS (147) ;

FFTHENM=ABS ( PEE!

MTH

44)*

56: IFFTHENX=PEEK

1) *256: IFNL<>@THENX

X+62)/256) :POKEL74, (X+62
251, PEEK (45)
:POKE253, PEEK (45):
E254, PEEK (46) +20:SYS(X+2)

50 SYS (X+62+ ((1+-F) *5120))

POK

Here’s a quick breakdown of what the BASIC portion dot

Line 10 - As we discussed last issue. Clears the screen; sets up variable F to
indicate a 1 for 128 mode, or a zero for 64 mode; initializes variable M to
zero; checks to see if we're in 128 mode, and drops out to line 20 ifwe aren't;
sets variable M to 1 if we're in 80-column mode, or zero if we're in
40-column mode; puts the computer into 2 MHz fast mode if we're in 80-
column mode, or exits to line 20 if we're in 40-column mode; makes a
centered 40-column window on the 80-column screen,

Line 20 - Sets variable X to the address holding the first BASIC line links
according to the proper mode (64 or 128).

Commodore World

Line 30 - Sets variable NL to the address holding the next BASIC line link;
if the addi nonzero, sets X to equal NL, then loops back to the
beginning of the line. The program will loop here until X holds the address
of the final line link that holds two zero bytes at the end of the BASIC
program, at which point it will drop down to execute line 40.

Line 40 - Checks to see if the computer is in 128 mode, and skips ahead to
line 50 if itis.

Line 41-This line calculates where your machine language program should
be located (at 62 bytes past the start of the last line link), and places this
address in pointers at 175 (SAE) and 176 (SAF). It also copies the low byte
of the start of BASIC variables into location 251 (SFB).

Line 42 - This line finishes setting up the pointers our ‘mover’ routine will
need by copying the high byte of the start of BASIC variables to 252 (SFC);
i 3 (SED) and 254 ($FE) are set up with the low and high bytes of
the target address, which is 5120 bytes above the current start of BASIC
variables area. After all the variables are set, a SYS to the ‘mover’ routine is
performed. This moves your machine code up 5120 bytes, to where it
would be ona 128. After this has executed, the program resumes at line 50.

Line 50 - This line performs a SYS to your machine language program. If
your machine language program ends with an RTS, it will return to this
BASIC program, but since there are no further BASIC lines to execute, the
program will end,

Now that we've covered what the BASIC portion does, we can get on with
adding the machine language ‘mover’ routine. If you have not already
entered the BASIC code, do sonow, Be sure to enter it in 128 mode ona 128,
and make sure that each line is exactly as shown. You may wish to save a
temporary copy to disk after you have entered it. Also, since the program
won't operate correctly without the ‘mover’ and some additional machine
language to move, don't RUN it. Instead, enter the 128's MONITOR mode,
and type the following command:

M 1D29

Ifyoucorrectly entered the BASIC portion ofthe program, then the first line
that prints on the screen after you enter this command should start with:

>O1D29 @0 00 00

If the first line does not start this way, you've entered something incorrect
somewhere along the way. Check your program against the original before
proceeding. Once everything is correct, enter the following assembly code
into the monitor:

>

@1D2F
@1D31
@1D33
@1D34
@1D36
01D38
@14a39
@1D3A

» > Pp >

DvD D>

Volume 1, Number 2

45

A @1D3B

BEQ

$1D60

8 s
A @1D49
@1D4B

A @1D51
A @1D53

A O1DSA
@1D5C

°

DS5E

A @1D60
A @01D62
A @1D64
A @1D65
A @1D67

Once you have this entered, perform a save from the monitor using the
following command:

S “UNI-LOAD”,@8,1C01,1D68

Inorder to test that the entire program is working, we'll have to add alittle
machine language program at the end of the ‘mover’. We'll want this to be
something that will give usa positive indication that everything is working,
so we'll just make a quick routine to print a ‘1’ to the screen. Enter the
following in the monitor:

A @1D68 LDA #$31
A @1D6A JSR $FFD2
A @1D6D RTS

Now save this with:
S “UNI-TEST* , 08,1001, 1D6E

Toperform the testing, younust LOAD and RUN the program UNI-TEST:
you cannot simply RUN the version that is already in memory, since it
depends on certain pointers that will only be set by reloading the program.
Try it from both 64 and 128 modes. If it doesn't work, double-check your
code for mistakes—they're easy to make.

Asitstands, this version will work well for starting up machine language
programs. To use it for mixed BASIC/ML programs, we'll have to add a
little bit ofcode to the BASIC part of the program; but we'll leave that for the
next issue of Commodore World. Meanwhile, play with this onea bit. You
might also take a look at the BASIC code used in the CHK-LIST utility,
located elsewhere in this issue. It takes a different approach, using data
statements to poke a machine language routine into different places in the
64 and 128; it works well for small programs with a few differences.

Commodore World

Peripheral Vision

Ly Doug Colton.

KS

AN INTRODUCTION TO SCSI DEVICES AND COMMANDS

SCSI (Small Computer System Interface): A local
1/0 bus which can be operated at various data rates
and which provides device-independence, easing
addition of storage, communication and other
expansion devices to the host computer system.

As if it were that simple, eh? So what is SCSI,
rei SI
{ding peripheral devices to computers from
different platforms. What I mean by different
platforms is this: regardless of computer type—
be it IBM, Macintosh, Amiga, Atari, C-64/128,
whatever—as long as the computer has an SCSI
controller, youmay add and use SCSI peripherals
on any of them.
designed specifically for one computer
platform—indeed, they are designed simply to
follow the SCSI standards,

SCSI peripherals come in an assortment of
flavors; optical scanners, tape drives, floppy
drives, hard disk drives, optical drives and more,
And since the SCSI standard has claimed wide
acceptance by the majority of peripheral
manufacturers, nearly every computer platform
that comes to mind has available for it some
means of utilizing SCSI peripherals.

tandard’ that was intended to

The peripherals need not be

Reality Check...

Before we allow ourselves to be overcome with
visions of flatbed scanners or CD-ROM drives
tied into ourC-64/128, thereare some important
aspects of SCSI to consider. The SCSI ‘standard’
for the most part, a hardware interface
standard. Inorderto make a computer work with
any specific SCSI peripheral, some type of
software (or firmware) driver is required, The
purpose of this driver is to adapt the operating

Volume 1, Number 2

system of the particular computer so that it can
ive communicate to the § peripheral.
Devices of the same type can often use a driver
interchangeably. But devices of differing types
will undoubtedly require separate drivers.
much for ‘standard’, eh?

Smart Peripherals

When it comes to hard drive mechanisms, you
might wonder what it is that makes SCSI drives
different than the other types of drives around,
such MFM or RLL hard drive types.
two drive types were often found on IBM PC and
systems, and were considered to be ‘dumb’
drives. Why so? This designation stems from the
fact that the computer itself had to perform all
‘low level’ reading and writing of data on these
drives. SCSI drives are considered to be ‘smart’
because the

have what is called an ‘embedded
controller’ sor of their own built right
into the drive circuitry. This makes SCSI drives
very much like the floppy drives we use on

46

Commodore systems; we need only send a
command to the drive (along with any data
required to perform the task), and let the drive
itself sweat the details.

You may have also heard of IDE drive:
common on IBM AT type computers. Thes
also considered to be ‘smart’ drives, and were
designed to minimize controller interfacing
requirements for hard drives on IBM and ‘clone’
computers. They fall short of SCSI drives for
versatility, but do help to cheapen the cost of a
system by a small amount.

Hardware Issues

Now that I've'stepped init’ and declared SCSI to
be superior in versatility, I'll naturally have to
explain this a bi

Expandability is a key issue for many users,
and SCSI clearly wins out over MFM, RLL, and
IDE drive types in this category. Any hard drive,
no matter what type it is, requires some kind of
controller to interface the computer's signals to
the hard drive's signals. Common MFM, RLL
and IDE controllers are designed to manage only
two hard drive mechanisms—whereas SCSI
controllers are designed to handle up to seven
SCSI device

This brings to light two important advantages:
SCSI allows for more devices to be attached toa
single controller; and these devices are not limited
to being only hard disk drives, But wait—there’s
even more expandability with SCSI.

The SCSI interface allows any SCSI device
attached to the controller to have up to 8
individual ‘logical units’ built-in. This means that,
in theory, the SCSI bus could support 56 drives.
In reality, however, multiple logical units in a

Commodore World

single SCSI device is practically unheard of. Still, it's nice to know that the
capability is there for possible implementation in the future. Furthermore,
if you have an interest in direct SCSI device programming, you'll have to
deal with ‘logical unit numbers—even though the devices you'll be
programming will probably have only a single drive or unit.

No discussion of SCSIwould be complete without bringing up the’black
magic’ aspects that many of have experienced. Indeed, while SCSI has
serious advantagesin expandability, these capabilities do not come without
some quirks,

First ofall, itisimportant to know that SCSI devices attached to the same
bus absolutely must be jumpered for different SCSI device numbers. The
location of these jumpers will vary from one device to the next, but isalmost
always performed with three sets ofjumper pins. Different combinations of
having jumper blocks attached to these pins yield a device number from 0
to 7. SCSI devices which are purchased pre-mounted in I often
have a simple thumbwheel switch on the rear panel to facilitate ig the
SCSI device number.

Another consideration is setting of the device's parity enable. Some host
adaptors (SCSI controllers) may require parity to be enabled; such is the
case with the host adaptor in the CMD HD Series hard drives. Other host
adaptors may require parity to be disabled, while others yet may not care
how parity is set. Locating the parity jumper will generally require having
documentation on the specific SCSI device being used.

Bus termination is also an important factor in making sure your SCSI
peripherals operate correctly, It is also one of the strangest factors of
working with SCSI devices. According to the SCSI specification, each end
ofthe SCSI ‘chain’ must be terminated; furthermore, devices located in the
middle of the chain must NOT be terminated. Terminators generally
consist of SIP (Single In-line Package) resistor packs that plug directly into
sockets located on a SCSI device's embedded controller board near the
SCSI connector. Pre-mounted external SCSI add-on devices generally are
not terminated when sold, though many come with a simple external
plug-in terminator that mounts easily in one of the ports on the back of the
case, You may also purchase this type of termination module separately
from many computer supply stores.

So what was all this about ‘black magic’? Here’s the scoop: incorrect
setting of SCSI device numbers, parity, or improperly terminated SCSI
chains can cause some very odd errors, or may cause your SCSI peripherals
to fail to operate completely. Worse yet, terminationis far from beingatrue
science. Due to signal loss and impedance shift caused by multiple
connections and mismatched interconnecting cables, I've seen SCSI chains
that wouldn't work when both ends are terminated. I've seen others that
simply wouldn't allow expanding beyond three or four devices—even
though seven (plus the host adaptor) should have been possible. Thus,
when expanding a SCSI chain, it is imperative to know the status of each of
your SCSI devices with reference to device number, parity and termination,
And ifeverything is set as it should be and things still do not work, it’s time
to experiment.

oa

By Your Command...

Most SCSI peripherals fall into the ‘common’ category of being storage
devices, and for those that do, a set of common instructions were devised.
This helps to keep a wide range of drive mechanisms compatible with
drivers, Itis this set ofcommands that we will focus on, though once youare
familiar with how the SCSI command structure operates—and how to
implement it in your own code—you should easily be able to work with
other SCSI devices by obtaining documentation from the manufacturer.
We'll also be using the CMD HD Series hard drive as our ‘host adaptor’ in

Volume 1, Number 2

47

these instructions, since it provides a DOS command for sending SCSI
commands directly to SCSI devices attached to it.

Every SCSI command is made up of several parameters which
Commodore programmers will probably find similar in format tothe burst
command instructions used with the Commodore 1571, 1581, and CMD
devices. The first byte of each instruction is the OPERATION CODE—the
command itself. The OPERATION CODE byte is made up of two parts, as
illustrated below: the GROUP CODE (bits5 through 7), andthe COMMAND
CODE (bits 0 through 4).

ave] 7 Ts [5 [4
Group Code |

Since the GROUP CODE is made up of 3 bits, there are 8 possible groups,
‘These groups have been defined in the standard in the following manner:

3[2[1]o
Command Code

Group 0 Six-Byte Commands
Group 1 Ten-Byte Commands
Groups 2through4 —_Reserved

Group 5 Twelve-Byte Commands

Groups 6 and 7 Vendor-unique

SCSI devices used in the CMD HD Series hard drives will accept Group 0
($00-1F) and Group 1 ($20-3F) commands, though the HD is capable of
working with any of the command groups. The list below shows the
common commands which you can find in these two groups:

Operation Code (HEX
00

Test Unit Ready

01 Rezero Unit

03 Request Sense

04 Format Unit

07 Reassign Blocks

08 Read

OA Write

0B Seek

12 Inquiry

15 Mode Select

16 Reserve

17 Release

1A Mode Sense
Start/Stop Unit
Send Diagnostic

25 Read Capacity

28 Read

2A Write

2B Seek

2E Write and Verify

4e Verify

37 Read Defect Data

3B Write Buffer

3c Read Buffer
Read Long
Write Long

While therearea number of other commands, some of those not listed may
well not be implemented on all drives. You can see from the list that some

Commodore World

Group 1 commands duplicate the Group 0
commands, The difference is that Group 1
dressing, which will
be explained later in a little more detail,

The following Command Descriptor Blocks
show the complete command structure of Group
0(Six-Byte) and Group 1 (Ten-Byte) commands.

commands have extendeda

GROUP 0 COMMAND DESCRIPTOR BLOCK

pyre~ eit els[s[alel]i1]fo
0 ‘Operation Code
1 LUN LBA (it required) (MSB)
2 Logical Block Address (if required)
3 Logical Block Addross (if required) (LSB)
4 Transter Length (if required)
5 Control Byte.

GROUP 1 COMMAND DESCRIPTOR BLOCK

fre] 7 Le [s[+l[sle [slo
Operation Code
LUN Reserved RA

Logical Block Address (i roquired) (MSB)

Logical Block Address (if required)

Logical Block Address (i required)
Logical Block Address (if required) (LSB)
Reserved

Transfer Length (if required) (MSB)
Transtor Length (it required) (LSB)
Control Byte

eleol~lolalslolrw|-lo

Let's take a look at the terms used to describe the
contents of the CDB's shown above.
Operation Code ~ We've seen this already. This is
comprised of the Group Codein the upper 3 bits,
and the Command Code in the lower 5 bits.

LUN (Logical Unit Number) - This makes up the
upper three bits of Byte 1, and indicates which
logical unit the commandis intended for. It's rare
fora device to have more than one logical unit, so
these bits will usually all be zero.

RA (Relative Addi

's) - This is the low bit in Byte 1

on Group 1 (and Group 2) commands; however,
andean

itis rarely implemented on SCSI devi
safely be set at zero,

ed by commands in logical sequence,
starting at Block 0 and extending up to the last
lable block on the device. This kind of
addressing takes the place of physical block
addressing, which would require specifying a

cylinder, platter (side), and sector.
Because SCSI devices can have a very large

amount of storage space, the Logical Block

Volume 1, Number 2

Address is broken up over more than one Byte.
Group 1 commands can address more storage
space than Group 0 commands, and have four
Bytesare set aside forthe LBA. Group 0 commands
have 21 bits set aside for the LBA. The high order
bitsforthe LBA (identified with MSB)are located
in Byte 1 of Group 0 commands, and in Byte 2 of

Group 1 commands. The low order bits of the
LBA (identified with LSB) are located in Byte 3 of
Group 0 commands, and Byte 5 of Group 1
commands. All bitsin-between flow logically from
the MSB down to the LSB.

For multiple-block operations, the LBA
indicates the first, or starting Block to be used by
the command,

Transfer Length - The Transter Length is used to
indicate the number of Blocks to be transferred;
in some commands it might also be used to
indicate a number of Bytes to be transferred
(calleda Parameter List Length) or to indicate the
number ofbyteswhich areexpected tobereturned
by a command (called an Allocation Length).

Group 0 commands use a single Byte for
Transfer Length, and can transfer a maximum of
256 Blocks (1 through 255, or 0 for 256). This
value is given in Byte 3 of Group 0 command

Group 1 commands havea two-Byte Transfer
Length, and are capable of transferring up to
65,535 Blocks. The high byte (MSB) is placed in
Byte7, and the Low Byte (LSB) is placed in Byte 8.
A Transfer Length of 0 in both Bytes ofa Group 1
command means zero,

Control Byte-The Control Byteis mostly made up
ofunusedand reserved bits. Only bits Oand 1 are
areused for LINKED command
execution, which allows the device to process

more than one command in succession. Bit 1 is
the Flag bit, and bit 0 is the Link bit.

If the Link bit is zero, then the Flag bit must
also be zero, This state indicates that no linked
command execution is expected,

Ifthe Link bit is 1, then the Flag bit determine

the type of message returned by the device upon
is

completion of the linked command, Ifthe Fl
zero, then the device returns INTERMEDIATE
status and sends the LINKED COMMAND
ge. If the Flag bit is 1, the
device returns INTERMEDIATE statusand sends
the LINKED COMMAND COMPLETE (WITH
FLAG) message.

Reserved or Unused - All Reserved and/or Unused
bits or Bytes must be set to zero.

With the basies of the CDB's (Command
Description Blocks) now behind us, it’s time to

48

take a look at how we can make use of SCST
commands with our Commodore computers.

CMD’s Send SCSI Command
While we do know that the Xetec Lt. Kernal hard
drive could be coaxed into performing custom
SCSI command programming at a low level, to
date, only the CMD HD Series hard drive
controllers have been supplied with a high-level
ammingeasier
for the less-experienced programmer. And
because the HD has its own microprocessor and
ample free RAM, the programmer need only deal
with the results of this programming, and thus
avoid having to handle data transfers direetly,
But before we can jump headlong into the
actual SCSI commands and programming, we
need to understand how toissue these commands
to the SCSI device via the CMD HD host adaptor.
As shown in the CMD HD User's Manual, the
Send SCSI command has the following syntax:

(de) CHRS (b1)

where:
If=_ the logical file number for the command

channel

de = the SCSI device number

bl= the low byte of the user defined SCSI data
buffer in the HD's RAM

bh=the high byte of the user defined SCSI
data buffer in the HD's RAM

cb = thecommand bytesofthe SCSI command
to be sent

‘Thelogical filenumberforthecommand channel
is the first parameter from the OPEN statement
used to open the command channel to send this
command. In this example, /fequals 15:

OPEN15,12,15

The base drive built into the HD is SCSI device 0,
External devices will have other addresses
extending up to through device 7.

When you want to send an SCSI command to
the CMD HD, you must first define an area of
RAM in the HD to use as a buffer. Many SCSI
commands will require this buffer space to
transfer actual data, such as when reading and
writing blocks of information. We'll be using the
8K of free RAM in the HD starting at $3000.

‘The CDB data which we discussed earlier make
up the remainder of the bytes sent with the
command,

TO BE CONTINUED IN ISSUE 3

Commodore World

How to Type In Program Listings Appearing in
Commodore World

While Commodore World currently doesn't make it a habit of publishing
type-in programs, a number of our columns do require entering sample
routines. For this purpose, we have created our CHK-LIST utility for the
Commodore 64 and 128. tility use a 16-bit CRC checksum method to
verify that you have correctly entered each program line, and that each of
the characters in the program lines are in the correct order.

You'll notice that program listings appear with a column of values to the
left of the program lines, These values are the CHK-LIST values andare not
to be entered tof the program. A similar set of values are generated
by the CHK-LIST utility to allow you to verify that everything has been
entered correctly,

Enter the CHK-LIST program from BASIC. You can use either a C-64 or
a C-128 computer, Ifyou use a C-128, it can be in either 64 or 128 mode. Be
sure to enter each line carefully to avoid mistakes—until you actually have
CHK-LIST working, finding errors in program entry won't be easy. After
you have finished entering the program, be sure to SAVE a copy to disk
before you attempt to RUNit, justin case. Ifyou aren't familiar with how to
save a program to disk, you can use the following command:

SAVE"CHK-LI

Touse CHK- intoyourcomputerand type RUN, Makesurethat
any program youare currently working on is saved first, or start CHK-LIST
before you begin typing in a new program, After you have CHK-LIST in
memory and running, type NEW. You may now either load or begin typing
the program you wish to have CHK-LIST check on. Whenever you want to
check your program type in the appropriate SYS command given below:

C-64 or C-128 in 64 mode:
C-128 in 128 mode:

49152

Note that when typing in listings, some special characters will
bri

appear in
. For example, {CLR/HOME} means that you should enter the Clear
which is done by holding down the SHIFT key while you press the
HOME key. Other times you may seea numberahead of the key name, such
as{3 SPACES} or (5 CRSR L}. This means youshould press the key indicated
the number of times shown. Most special keysare easy to identify, since the
text used will generally match the text on the key. Exceptions are the space
bar {SPACE}, and cursor keys which include directions ((CRSR UPL AC
DN}, {CRSRL}and (CRSRRT)). Besure to use the correct ke
for color keys, such as <CTRL><2> for (WI IT}.

combinations

CHK-LIST

CHK-LIST (cont.)

5

=ABS (PEEK (65533)/=255) :M=49152: 1PFTHE
864

C=0: PRINT" {CLR/HOME} WORKING" ;

READD: IFD=-256THEN4O

2 3@ C=C+D:IFD<@AND! THEN2@

3316 | 31 IFD<@THEND=0-D:M=M-1

@7FO | 32 POKEM, D:M=M+1:PRINT" . ";:GOTO20

S78A | 40 PRINT: READCK : IFC<>CKTHENPRINT" ERROR I
N DATA STATEMENTS!" :END

679 | 50 PRINT"DONE.":END

8D92 | 60 =:

E7FE | 49152 DATA 165,43, -45,133,251,165, 44, -46
+133,252

B2AE | 49160 DATA 169,0,141,36,193, -20,169,147,

DATA 210,255,32,194,192,-19,160,0,

DATA 37,193,-20,177,251, 133, 253,20

DATA 238,37,193,-20,200,177,251,13

DATA 208,3,238,37,193,-20,173,37,1

93,-20

6C15 | 49200 DATA 201,2,208,1,96,200,177,251

E7@E | 49208 DATA 170,200,177, 251, 32,205, -50,18
9,~-142,169

6795 | 49216 DATA 6,133,211, -236,169,61,32,210,
255,

F8OF | 49224 DATA 169,32,32,210,255,160,2,177

9735 | 49232 DATA 251,32,213,192,-19, 200,177, 25
1,32

734 | 49240 DATA 213,192,-19,200, 177,251,240,6
32

p99D 49248 DATA 213,192,-19,76,90,192,-19,173
+191,192,-19

AC30 | 49256 DATA 32,167,192,-19,173,190,192,-1

9,32,167

Volume 1, Number 2

49

49264
7253
49272

DATA 192,-19,169,13,32,210,255, 165
DATA 133,251,165,254,133,252,238,3
& 193,-20,173,36,193,-20, 201, 2:
DATA 76,18,192,-19,162,0,189,1,193

DA’

240,6,32,210,

55, 232,208,245,

4 DATA 228,255,201,13, 208,249, 32
DATA 228,255,208,251,76,8,192,-19,

DATA 106,106,106,196,32,180, 192, ~-1
DATA 32,180, 192,-19,96,41,15,170,1

DATA 20,193, ~20, 32,210,255,96,0,0
DATA @,@,169,0,141,190,192 19,141
DATA 191,192,-19,169,33,141,192,19
19,169

369 DATA 16,141,193,192,-19,96,1

8,7

49368 DATA 41,127,77,191,
+192,-19

49376 DATA 24,14,190,192,~-19,46,191,
-19,144

49384 DATA 18,173,192,192,-19,77,190,192
7719,141

49392 DATA 190,192,-19,173,193,1
7,191,192,-19

49400 DATA 141,191,192,
8,215
49408
49416
49424
49432
49440

192,-19,141,191

192;

DS2F

DCA6 92,-19,7

6032 -19,104,10, 202,20

DATA 96,13,80,82,69,83,83,32
DATA 60,82,69,84,85,82,78,62
DATA 13,13,13,0,48,49,50,51
DATA 52,53,54,55,56,57,65, 66
DATA 67,68,69,70,0,0,-256,37944

Commodore World

Carrier Detect

ON-LINE CONFERENCES: GENIE HOSTS A VISIT WITH THE COMMODORE GURU

Many on-line services such as GEnie,
CompuServe, and Delphi offer ‘real-time’
conferences—the electronic equivalent to having
a guest speaker come to a user group meeting.
This gives callers a chance to meet with others of
similar interests and sometimes meet a special
guest they may never have the opportunity to
meet in person.

Recently, the Commodore Roundtable on
GEnie had Jim Butterfield over for a real time
conference. Butterfield’s name is often followed
by “Commodore Guru”, as he is well respected
for his knowledge of our computers. Back before
the Commodore Pet, Butterfield was writing
programs, giving lectures, and writing articles
and books about computers. He has used,
programmed, and written stacks of articles about
each new computer Commodore put out on the
market. Many have driven thousands of miles to
hear him speak, but thistime users wishing toask
him questions and hear his views could do so
without leaving home.

Just what is the Commodore Guru doing these
days? Does Jim Butterfield still usea Commodore
64 or 128? Has he too embraced MS-DOS
computers like others have? How does he feel
about the world of computing today? These and
many other questions were answered during the
conference. Jim uses a C-128, writes articles for
Compute Gazette on Machine Language
programming, and use:
systems to do odd jobs, including, as he stated it,
“clumsy ones like the clones.

ava

iety of “other”

When asked how his association with
Commodore computers began, Jim took us back
to 1963 when he became a programmer, “not on
abusiness machine, with those new fangled classy

Volume 1, Number 2

languages Fortran and Cobol, but instead on a
real-time beast that had to be worked in Machine
Language. When microcomputers started to
appear in 1976, it was (forme) likea return tothe
good old days. | restarted on a KIM-1 machine,
one of the first 6502 boards, 1K of RAM, 2K of
ROM, and it could play chess. Because it was
about the first factory-assembled system, it was
also the starting point for a user community.
Kim-1 User Notes was a popular newsletter (for
its era), and later | collaborated on a book called
The First Book of KIM(a much-copied title style).
Now: Commodore acquired the manufacturer of
the KIM-1, and was persuaded to launch the first
personal computer, the PET.”

The Petstill used 6502 chip, which Butterfield
had programmed before, and was familiar with,
so he felt well qualified to assist others with their
Pets, and has continued helping others with their
computers for the last fifteen years.

Butterfield listed the four computers he
currently owns and usesregularly:a Commodore
128, “used for general programming and fooling
around, and for preparing the M/L articles that |
do for the Gazette.” An Amiga 2000, an Amiga
600, plus “a small and quite ancient MS-DOS
machine.” He has all four systems networked
together, so he can pass data between them. In
his backup computer collection, Butterfield has
an extra 64, a B-128, a B-256, a PET 8032, anda
couple of PET dual disks, “Just in case | come
across something that needs metolook way back.
Hard to find room for more than three or four
operating computers and their peripherals and
screens. Gets cluttered.”

Asked if his family shares his interest in
Commodore computers, it was interesting to

50

learn that the Guru does indeed have a family:
“My wife regards computers as something of a
harmless aberration; I suspect she considers it
less harmful and less costly than drinking. My
ive year old daughter is getting quite interested
in computers (I'm not pushing) and may get her
‘own soon.”

Many questions were asked about the future of
our Commodore 8-bit machines, and what steps
we can take. Butterfield observed that “we are
into computer ‘fashion’ rather than questions of
technicalexcellencehere. Justas, with VCRs, most
people see BetaMax as technically superior to
VHS, the tech arguments counted for little. The
8-bit computers will work for a long time, and
wouldalways presenta cost-effective way oftaking
on some kinds of work, But I fear they are out of
hion, and we won't see too many new ones,

...Being orphaned is never fun, ofcourse. Itmakes
obtaining ANYTHING harder. As I see it, the
most serious thing would be that users could no
longer get the custom chips used by the 64 and
128. Say, the PLA, the SID, and some similar,
There may be a second-source possibility; but
stockpiling older machines may also be a good
move for the 64/128 community.

Itseems only natural, with the sheer volume of
programs that Jim Butterfield has written over
the years to be asked about what he considers the
best programs forthe C64and about his favorites,
his own and those by others. He commented that
he's impressed by programs that e both
technical excellenceand aesthetic appeal,” noting
that “Best” is a relative term. He went on to
comment that some of the most brilliantly
conceived and executed programs such as GEOS,
and others like LITTLE COMPUTER PEOPLE

Commodore World

and JUMPMAN are programs he seldom runs. “I mostly run my own stuff.
That isn’t even for reasons of excellence; it's just that I'm comfortable with
my own programs (And I try to target my programs for DUMB users, which
is what I turn out to be later when [ use them).” It’s reassuring to know that
even Gurus can run into problems with their own programs. Of his own
programs, Butterfield said that about eight of the 144 or so he's written
could be considered classics, and listed a few, such as: SuperMon, Copy-All,
and UniCopy, adding, “oddly, one of the programs I was most pleased with
is FileSort, which is almost unknown, [It] grabsa “standard” typefile, sorts
it, and writes the result. Understands about computer related stuff, like
multiple fields, numeric/alpha, and ascending/descending. Ran perfectly
the first time I wrote it. Well, almost.”

‘The conversation turned to another Butterfield natural, unexplored
computer territory such as the C65 computers that Commodore moved
from their warehouses to mail order firms recently. Butterfield explained,
“Commodore made a few dozens, prototypes, of the C65 and recently blew
them out of the back door. There are quite a few proud new C65 owners
trying to find out how the insides of their machines work. And, being
prototypes, they are NOT allidentical. The C65 hasa new custom proc
chip with a LOT of new instructions that never existed before, not even in

other “clone” chips. It has anew colour screen capability, can be clocked at
a MUCH higher rate—and, yes, it does have bank switching. There are 255
bank numbers, although I don’t think youcan really put that many in. And
the machine can be triggered to be a 64 (as does the 128).”

The conference went on to more detailed discussions, including ML
programming questions about Bank switching in the 128, and further
details concerning the C-65. Many users were able to ask questions, and
several commented to Jim on things they've learned from him over the
years.

This is what on-line conferences are all about; they give us the chance to
meet fellow Commodore users, and ask some of the most respected
and writers questions in a ‘real-time’ format. There's far
personality” to on-line conferences than can be shown in a short
azine article. Be sure to check out the conferences on your favorite on-
line network!

programmers

Quoted text used with permission and is copyrighted © 1994 by General Electric
Information Services (GEnic). For a complete transcript of the conversation with
Jim Butterfield, download file #14633, BUTTERFIELD.TXT, from the
Commodore RT on GEnie (page 625:3).

On-LinE News Niesles
Compiled by Les Souga

Emulator Discussions out of COMP.SYS.CBM
Results from a vote conducted by a neutral third party on Usenet have
resulted in the creation of several new newsgroups to cover the discussions
ofemulator programsand hardware. The comp.sys.cbmnewsgroup, which
covers the range of Commodore 8-bit computers, has in the past been
inundated with articles and messages concerning IBM and other platform
computers emulating the C64 and other Commodore computers, causing
tension and annoyanceamongst true Commodore users. With newsgroups
designed specifically to discuss these emulators, the comp.

ysgroup can remain strictly related to Commodore specific topi
newly created newsgroups include: comp.emulators.announce,
comp.emulators.cbm, comp.emulators.apple2 and comp.emulators.misc.

The

DTJBBS Revision 940521

DTJBBS, a Commodore 64 BBS program, has been revised. This BBS
supports 300 baud to 38.4K bps modems using the SWIFTLink cartridge,
and supports all Commodore 1541, 1571, 1581 disk drives as well as
CMD's RAMLink and Hard drives. DTJBBS is available as shareware from
Andrew Bernhardt, P.O. Box 669, Beatty, Nevada, 89003. The author
requests a small (not more than $35) shareware fee. DTJBBS is available for
downloading on the support BBS, Second Home Electronic Cottage, (702)-
553-2869 (300-9600 bps V.32). The BBS can be can also be downloaded
from GEnie - file numbers 14910, 14911, 14912, and 14913.

QWKRR128 v4.3 Soon to be Released

Rod Gasson’s 128 off-line mail reader has been upgraded and is currently
inthe Beta testing stage. Enhancements include macros, which aredesigned
tospeed typing, as well as offer user possibilities including message “intro's”
and “sign offs”. Other new features include new character sets which allow
uuencoded files to be saved in a format that can be translated properly, the
ability to save text files in PET or ASCII format, centronics printer support,
and screen blanking. QWKRR128 V4.3 will beavailableon on-line services
and bulletin boards under the following names: QWKRR43.TXT,
QWERR43A.SEX, QWKRR43B.SFX and QWKRRUT.SFX. QWKRR128 is

Volume 1, Number 2

51

a shareware program. Registration allows use of all the features of the
program. Registration fee is $15.00 U.S. or $20.00 Australian funds, For
more information, or to register, contact Rod Gasson, 90 Hilliers Rd,
Reynella 5161, South Australia.

NZP12811.SE ) id Schmoll, gives 128 users the
ability to unzip MS-DOS PXzip 1.02 files. QPE is a small utility program
which is used in conjunction with QWKRR128, giving an option to dissolve
ARC ed or ZIPed mail packets and load the off-line mail reader, Note that
UNZIP128 unzip's PKzip 1.02 files, not PKzip 2.04g files. The shareware fee
for this program is $10.00. Contact David Schmoll, 1703 Pagosa Way,
Aurora, CO. 80011.

New Dialogue 128 Extension Available

Written by Henry Sopko, BLANK-IT.EXT, avery short extension program
for the Dialogue 128 term program, will blank the screen after a minute of

inactivity from the computer keyboard. The screen is reactivated when a
key is pressed, without interrupting program activity such as during a file
transfer. The file is available in uuencoded form in the comp.sys.cbm
newsgroup on the Internet, or on Fidonet,

Commodore Central

Delphi's Commodore Central SIG now offers three different conference
nights. New Members can learn about Delphi on Monday nights,
Wednesday night conferences center around using GEOS, while Friday
nightsare open discussion nights. Each conference beginsat 9pm El
Commodore Centeral SIG message forum has Commodore conversati
ranging from inventive disk drive cleaning to Commodore magaz
SIG also offers a gateway to read the COMP.SYS.CBM newsgrour
as a menued system to retrieve Commodore files from Internet FTP sites.
Delphi offers 5 hours free access for new users. To join Delphi, dial 1-800-
695-4002 by modem. Once connected, press the return key several times.
When prompted for a password, type “FREE”.

Commodore World

BBS SPOTLIGHT

OMNI 128

A CHAT WITH OMNI 128 AUTHOR BRIAN BELL

How did Omni 128 come about?

Omni 128 BBS had it’s humble beginnings asa simple machine lan
interrupt carrier detect routine fora PUNTER transfer protocol ina friend’s
BBS program. Later in 1986, I began to experiment with writing terminals
that could handle the speed of a 2400 bps modem, and this eventually
evolved into a machine language operating system with a BASIC face on
top. Omni is currently a group of large programs which run on top of the
ML operating system.

I've noticed that the program is upgraded often, What's the current version?
‘The main portion of the BBS is currently at version B.7W, which has no
particular meaning—the “B” doesn't mean “Beta”. But this method allows
me to keep track of upgrades to the main. All modules are individually
dated using a year/month/day/letter system.

And the cost?
The BBS package is $65.00, and the completed manual will be $15.00.

And what does that include?

Approximately 100 on-line modules and utilities come with the system,
including a simple network for communicating with other Omni 128
systems, and also a special mode allowing communication with Color 64
Network compatible BBS's. There is no current link to other networks such
as FIDO orInternet, but plansare well developed for this tobeimplemented
soon. On-line game packages are available for downloading at various
systems and the home support board.

Are there additional items a SysOp might want that would cost extra?

Allof the system files and extras are currently included with the BBS, but I
also will program special applications, time permitting—either for free, or
for a set fee, depending on the feasibility and complexity of the project. I
have yet to charge anything for the special modules written for other
SysOps, and they are available to all.

Could you tell us which modems are supported?
Modem types tested and supported include (in order of preference), U.S.
Robotics Sportster 14.4K modem, the Supra96/14.4K FAXModem (digital
readout versions), the Supra 2400, Packard Bell 2400, Avatex 2400, and
Aprotek C-24 mini modem. Other modem types may or may not work
without additional programming, depending on individual characteristics.
I'm willing to test new modem types for compatibility/programming if
they are shipped to me for evaluation. I'm in the process of testing different
models on a one-by-one basis, and with 28.8K modems coming down
drastically in price, ($180 has been mentioned) these are on the top of my
list to work on.

Interfaces supported include CMD's SwiftLink, the OmniTronix Deluxe
RS-232 interface, or any other compatible user port interface. Hardware

Volume 1, Number 2

52

handshaking lines for high speed operation is desirable, and some brands
do not support that—Supra and Practical Peripherals come to mind.
SwiftLink offers superior performance in all conditions, even at 2400 bps.

Allbaud rates from 38,400 bps on downwards are supported, Omni 128
has the ability to use the full 38,400 bps bandwidth for all carrier rates,
without undesirable “over-runs” ofcallersatlower speeds, a special feature
unique to Omni and not found in any other BBS, even for 16/32 bit
computers.

What kind of drive support does Omni 128 have, and are there any minimum
requirements?

The entire line of CMD drives and RAMLink based storage devices are
supported, as are standard Commodore DOS compatible disk drives, such
as the 1581/1571/1541 series. Minimum requirement is either a CMD
RAMLink with 4 megabytes, or a CMD HD-Series hard drive. Xetec LT.
Kernal drives are not currently supported.

Is there support for special features in any of the devices you mentioned?
Omni 128 has a unique and reliable system supporting the flexible
subdirectory arrangement that the CMD hard drives and RAMLink can
use. 1581 subdirectories are also supported. Either parallel or serial cables
may be used on the CMD HD. Omni 128 reads the real time clock in CMD
devices to set the BBS timeand date, andalso recognizes the time-and-date
stamp in all file operations such as file copying, pattern searching of
directories, etc.

Terminal emulations seem to abound on Omni 128, Which ones are supported?
‘The remote caller is supported with Commodore C/G graphics, ASCII,
IBM ANSI color, RIPscrip (remote imaging protocol), and SupeRes hires
graphics. ANSI and SupeRes modes are detected automatically on most
terminals, and soon so will the RIPscrip mode. RIPscrip allows mouseable
menus and other interactive features when calling from a RIPscrip
supporting terminal.

understand that Omni 128 has a very extensive message base capacity?

Yes. There are twenty root message base areas, each with 9 additional
automatically scanned bases, making up 191 automatically scanned areas
Further, up to 990,001 separate message bases can be supported for SIG
groups, and they can be entered simply by typing their number. Each
an handle up to 100 separate chains (threads) each with
n beautomatically weeded. Standard
sequential files are used, which are scanned at high speed.

unlimited responses, and responses

How about the upload and download areas?

The File Transfer section has the same generous limits as the message
<—up to 191 automatically scanned areas, or 990,001 SIG transfer
areas, each allowing up to 100 files. Each area can have a unique device,

Commodore World

path, and entry file. Files are shown using their
full filenames and corresponding numbers
the SysOp can elect to createa text file displ:
the available files in any way they choose - which
also displays at very high speed. File descriptions
are unlimited as they are stored in separate files,

, OF

Omni 128 seems to support a long list of file transfer
Protocols as well. Can you give us a rundown on
those?

For both uploading and downloading of files,
there is Punter, Multi-Punter, Xmodem
Checksum, and Xmodem CRC. Fordownloading
only, there is also Xmodem 1K CRC, Ymodem-
128 (batch-standard), Ymodem-1K (batch), and
Ymodem-1K/g (batch, streaming). Foruploading
only, there is a Zmodem batch receive system,
with individual file confirmation after
completion. A “resume” function isbeing worked
on.

Can you explain how Omni's networking options
operate?

‘The current networking system is comparable to
adirect bulletin and mail transfer facility with no
shared echoes. Plans to implement a UUCP type
network with QWK off-line reader support are in
the works, in conjunction with another
programmer who developed a very powerful
network for C-Net 128.

A special option allowing SysOps to exchange
files in batches is implemented. The system also
has a mode which allows sending and receiving
public and private messages to Color 64-type
network compatible systems.

You indicated earlier that there isn't a completed
operation manualasyet. Whatkind ofdocumentation
is provided with the system right now?

Currently, a 12 page setup document is included
with thesystem. Inaddition, text filesareincluded
containing approximately 150,000 bytes of
detailed update instructions describing new
features and how to install them. These
documentsand otherinformation gathered from
beta test SysOps over the last 6 years will provide
or the completed system manual.

the basis

How do you handle technical support for registered
SysOps?

Support for Omni 128 is a
BBS system at (206) 536-9353
andalsoviaU.S. Mail. Asecond dedicated support
line should be installed this summer ( 94).
Upgrades are released at the end of each month
on the home board, and can be mailed if desired.
Themany OmniSysOpsare usually glad toanswer
any questions a new SysOp may have.

able on the home
‘4 hours a day,

Volume 1, Number 2

Isthereanythingwe missed thatyou'dlikeour readers
to know about?

Omni 128 has been in development for almost 7
years, and has pioneered and perfected many
things which have since appeared on other
programs, plus many others which you won't
find available anywhere else.

Quite a few programmers have signed onto
this project in the past year, and have an
impressive array of program modules in
development and several finished. Omni’s
operating veneer is in
be modified by with BASIC,
though extensive mods to the “look” of the BBS
are possible without programming.

My aim is to continue to upgrade the program
in ways that best serve the 8, 16, and 32 bit
computing worlds.

Other unique features of interest to the System
Operator or Caller.

Virtual Memory Editor - A system text editor
which can hold over 43,000 bytes of text is
available on-line for the SysOp.

External Program Capabi
running modules designed spi
system, Omni can automatically call off-line
programs written in B, 7, either compiled
with BASIC 128 or plain BASIC, and even CS-DOS
auto-exec scripts. These programs run off-line,
and the BBS can be called automatically after
they are finished. This opens up a lot of
possibilities for beginning and advanced

ind as such can

- In addition to
ecifically for the

programmersalike, whowant special thingsdone
at midnight, for instance. Off-line programs can
berunat any time or date, determined ce
by the operator. No human intervention is
required once this is set-up.

Video Mode Control - Allows local sereen
printing to be disabled for maximum modem
input/output speed.

40 Column RGB- Lets you select a very vivid 40
column display on the 80 column screen.
Especially useful for creating and examining 40
column color graphics.

PrintFile- Allows output that would have gone
to the printer to be directed to a disk file on any
unused device. VERY useful!

Separate Last Call Date/Times - The system
maintains three separate ‘last call date-time’
(LCDT) for each caller. One records the last visit
to the system proper, another, the message base
Visit, and thelast, the transfer area. The callercan
edit both the message base and transfer LCDT
while on-line, to make different numbers of
messages or files appear as NEW. This is very
useful when a caller has not been on in a long

period, and doesn't wish to read largenumbers of
messages accumulated during the interval.

53

Multiple Login Modules - The SysOp can
arrange customize programs to execute before
the caller reaches the main menu. These can be
chained if desired.

Midnight Update - In addition to ma
standard

ny
sks the system performs at midnight,
customized applications can also be run and
chained. For instance, a SysOp might want to
have a certain group of files copied from one
location or device, to another, every night, or
only on certain days, ete.

You may order Omni 128 by sending a letter
requesting registration to:

Omni 128 BBS
4135 N, 36th
Tacoma, WA 98407

Detailed information is also available on the
author's system, Omni-World 128 (see listings),
in message base 9 (b9 from main) and transfer
area 13 (t13),

— ——————
Omni 128 BBS Systems

‘The followingisa partial list ofsystems operating
Omni 128 BBS. Some may not be running the
latest version - check the author's system for the
newest info.

9600 and 14.4K bps Systems
Omni World 128 (206) 536-9353
Huggybear's Den (206) 582-8285
Digital Illusions (216) 341-1414
Dead Poet's BBS (908) 288-8771
Dragon's Lair (915) 598-8442
The Battleship (713) 957-3217
Negative Ca$h Flow (813) 526-2971
The Wizards’ Workshop(713) 992-2526
Smart Modem (216) 543-1866
Cereal City BBS (616) 962-1390
Reaper's Place (519) 472-0641

Vic's BBS (618) 234-6235
Tardis BBS (805) 987-9541
Remote Control (316) 421-0333
The Twilight Zone/AZ (602) 827-2706
Cybernet 2000+ (813) 895-8915

2400 bps Systems

je Ranch (206) 536-4689
[eet Manor (916) 865-7011
The Coffee Shop (206) 565-6306
Civic 64/128 (805) 382-1125
Power User BBS (206) 427-1083

Commodore World

Over The Edge

By Charles A. Christianson

COMMODORE PROVES THAT YOU CAN FAIL IF YOU TRY HARD ENOUGH...

Although I have not been over burdened with
mail for this column, I have been answering a
tremendous number of questions about the
current status of Commodore. As we all know,
Commodore International, Ltd. has putits major
subsidiary Commodore Electronics, Ltd. into
voluntary liquidation to help sati
obligations to creditors. Thisannouncement was
made in an April 29, 1994 press release which
stated that thecompany wasfinally going tothrow
in the towel after posting substantial losses in
consecutive quarters. From what I hear, the
company is so cash poor that they simply cannot
afford to produce the products needed to fill
orders. Sad, isn’t it?

s bit of news sent the rumor mill into
high ge: rdofnolessthan three
companies which have already purchased
Commodore, and of five others that are engaged
in serious negotiations for the purchase. In terms
of factual data, there isn't much. Based on what I
have heard from reliable sources, who prefer to
remain nameless, there are two, maybe three
major companies interested in buying all or part
of Commodore, but anyone who really knows
what these companies actually want for their
money isn’t saying.

Ivery much doubt that any of these companies
are interested in resurrecting the entire product
line; certainly not right away, anyhow, Indeed,
ces are that one or more of these companies
interested only in purchasing intellectual
property such as chip sets and/or patents. The
factofthe matteris that very littleof Commodore's
Present product line is worth trying to salvage,
with the exception of perhaps the Amiga 1200
and their new CD-32 game machine. Why these

are

Volume 1, Number 2

two products? Well, the Amiga 1200isan example
of what Commodore has always done well with—
an inexpensive computer with a fair amount of
bang for the buck. It's CD-32 product, which only,
recently appeared in the U.S, marketplace has
thepotential tobea real contender in the fledgling
CD game machine market. Again, this machine
offers a lot for its low price, and is aimed directly
ata market which will see substantial growth in
the next couple of years.

So, why do [so quickly discount the other
product lines? Simple. The remaining Amiga
product line is overpriced and underpowered
compared with today's less expensive and
powerful DOS and Macintosh machines, Not to
mention the fact that buyers in that price range
typically are looking fora business machine with
support from major software vendors, A small
number of Amiga 4000's will probably be viable
for sale to the niche desktop video market, but it
won't amount to much.

Ididn't mention the 64 or 128, did 1? Don't get
me wrong; think thereis value to the 8-bit line—

54

but that isn't what most large companies would
think. Inthe computer industry, there'sa general
consensus that there is only one type of
computer—MS-DOS—and anything else is
inconsequential. This mentality is frustrating to
deal with, but unfortunately it is one that most
companies and financial institutions subscribe
to in today’s computer industry. Other 16- and
32-bit technology takesa back seat. Furthermore,
any 8-bit technology is considered so old and
obsolete by corporate types that anything having
to do with it will be ignored,

So when it comes down to the 8-bit C-64 and
C-128 computers, it’s impossible to tell at this
point just what will happen with any rights or
remaining inventory. Our attempts to contact
theCFO of Commodore regarding the liquidation
have been unsuccessful. It is my hope that there
will be more information regarding the C-64 and
C128 available by our next issue, You can bet I'll
be staying on top of this situation.

Another question everyone is asking is, how
does a company go from being a leader in their
industry to bankruptcy? Easy! Don’t bother with
marketing your product. Go to great lengths to
alienate the loyal customers that put you on top
(8 bit)! Spend outrageous amounts of money on
developing state of the art technology, but allow
it to become outdated! Grossly overpay your
executives and board of directors! And last but
notleast, makeawholeslew of miserable business
decisions which result in your inability to pay
your creditors! They have done such a great job,
I think they might want to consider a ‘How To’
video on dissolving a major company.

Let'stakea closerlookatsomeofCommodore’s
blunders, shall we? The Amiga is a good starting

Commodore World

point, since it marked Commodore's departure from the success they had
experienced with their 8-bit line.

The Amiga 1000: The first Amiga was the A1000, which showed the
promise of the Amiga architecture, but probably also caused a lot people
who may have been open to a new machine to turn and run. It released
before it was truly ready—the operating system was prone to crashing,
someone had bungled the motherboard layout, causing the connectors to
have pin assignments backwards on some of the ‘standard’ connections,
expandability was poorly planned. About the only good thing | c:
about the A1000 is that it didn’t stick around long.

The Amiga 500: The most successful Amiga model to date released with an
improved operating system which was even further refined over the life of
the product. Connections that were incorrect on the A1000 had been fixed,
andsomeimprovementshad been made on expanability, but those wishing
to expand it too far found themselves faced with a myriad of items taking
up more and more desk space. Alas the price was too high, especiall
expansion was almost mandatory tooperate
anything but a handful of games.

‘The Amiga 2000: Finally, an Amiga that
actually looked more like a desktop PC, the
A-2000 offered true expandability plus
newer and higher speed versions of the
680x0 family processor. It also had built-in
hard disk drive options, and an extra drive
bay. But all this came ata price that was far
too high for most of the market that

n say

nce

It was at this point that Commodore finally did something right.
Unfortunately, they did it way too late. The release of the A-600, A-1200,
and A-4000 all came within a few short months. New machines with
updated technology, and two of these (the A-600 and A-1200) aimed
arely at the low-end market—and priced right. The A-4000, while
intain the high-end for the desktop video niche, while the
other two models could effectively sell to the market Commodore had
owned in the past. In fact, many C-64 and C-128 owners were finally buying
their first Amiga.

Yet, Commodore was already deep in financial trouble by the time these
products released, and were

sq

expensive, did ms

sreading their resources even thinner by

in the interactive/game CD market with CD-32, successor to

trying to reg
the failed CDTV, The really bad part of this was that Commodore was
betting the farm on CD-32. Hadn't they learned from past experience?
While CD-32 is indeed a sound product, they should have been well aware
that they didn't have the money to market it successfully at this point. They
apparently felt that the 1993 Christmas selling season v
product, and that ina year it would be too
late. They poured resources into getting
cb- ly fora pre-Christmas release in
the U.S,, but failed to meet the deadline.
Whether they had an adequate marketing
campaign ready to meet this challenge,
we'll probably never know. Certainly, it
never materialized, Meanwhile, so much
had gone into ramping up production on
CD-32 for the expected ‘opening of the

s do or die forthe

Only Amiga
Makes It Happen

Commodore was used to selling to. A base
model A-2000 really shouldn't have cost
much more than an A-500; butit cost quite
a bit more, and the A-500 continued to
remain theleaderin sales. Itwasalso during
the life of the A-2000 that Mac's and PC's
began gaining some ground in the area of
graphics, anarea where the Amiga had ruled
uncontested,

COMMODORE

flood gates’, that Commodore could no
longer fulfill orders for A-1200and A-4000
They had __ seriously
‘stimated the demand for their new

machine:

unde
computermodels, while the failed planning
for CD-32 left them an abundance of this
product sitting in the warehouse.

ive

Was Commodoremanagementson

as to not recognize when they were making

The Amiga 3000: Commodore regained

some of the technological ground they had lost in the area of graphics.
However, the A-3000 was priced so high that it could only be considered by
those who might be shopping fora fully decked-out A-2000. Granted, some
of the cost was mandated by having a built-in SCSI controller and flicker-
fixer for working in interlaced graphics modes. While the enhancements
made the A-3000look good to the video market niche that Commodore had
carved out, incompatibilities delayed that very market from buying the
A-3000 while waiting for product upgrades. It wasaround this point in time
that Commodore decided to turn their marketing efforts (?) toward the
educational market—a plan doomed to failure with the lack of any true
educational software (not to mention the lack ofany real marketing savvy).
With ‘state-of-the-art’ PC's selling for half the price ofan A-3000, it too was
doomed to a dismal survival at best. Yet again, the A-500 continued to be
the leading seller for Commodore's Amiga line, but the price was still too
high. Commodore needed a cheap Amiga to capture the low-end market
that it had lost when they abandoned their 8-bit line.

Meanwhile, Commodore marketing had taken another seemingly
no-brainer victory, and turned itintoa complete loss. Their CDTV, with an
utter lack of marketing, poor distribution, a price just out of the reach of
consumers, withered and died. Their PC clone line, once successful, was
also dead.

Volume 1, Number 2

55

the same blunders, over and over?
Apparently, to some degree, they were. But the final demise was probably
struck more by greed than anything, Trying to recapture theirlost computer
sales and at the same time claim the top position in the interactive CD
market was indeed far more than a company in their situation should have
beenattempting. Indeed, it would seem totakea company blinded by greed
or desire for market dominance to take such a huge gamble,
Now, what effect will all of this have on everyone who continues to use
and enjoy the C-64 and C-128? Quite honestly, I don’t believe that it will
have any effect on those of us who continue to make use of these machines.

Why? Because we haven't had any real support from Commodore for many
years, What about the availability of the Commodore computers, disk
drives, mice, modems, and software? These items have been out of
production forsome timealready, yet there arestill thousands of computers
and disk drives available both through mail order companies as well as in
New hardware from CMD, Rio,
a large offering of programs still available round out the supply picture.

I guess the questions you need to ask yourself is; does my computer
continue to perform the tasks for which | use it? Do I want to spent a few
thousand dollars to switch platforms and learn how to use anew computer
and software? Most of the people I speak with answer the latter question

the pre-owned market. sland others, plus

u?

with a definite NO! How about y

Commodore World

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Volume 1, Number 2

56

In the next issue of

COMMODORE

WOKED

The Gane World
What's still available? What's current and
what’s new? We find the sources and make

comparisons in our super-big summer gaming
issue!

Phoenix Network.
Our on-line expert take a tour of this new

service and let’s us know what it has to offer
to Commodore 64/128 users.

CO re al Bi) oul Baer
POUTE JT BTI AZT
Hardware hackers: Build your own sound

digitizer board for the C-64 with these plans
from the author of DigiMaster.

CMDs Trackball
The first real Commodore 64/128 trackball
debuts, and we'll give you the first look.

SPECIAL REPORT:

It ain’t over ‘til it’s over! The latest news on
the Commodore liquidation/buyout front.

Pitre
IPS...
All the other news, beginners tutorials,

programming techniques, tips, GEOS banter,
on-line service info, and a whole lot more!

Commodore World

STAY IN TOUCH

pg

WORLD

THE NEWS MAGAZINE FOR COMMODORE 64/128 USERS

Our in-depth took into selecting

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interfaces

Just For Starters
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dvanced Techniques
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Not only will you find a
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Do it fast.

With a wide range of
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GEOS can operate at speeds
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a rks of Geowork

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nd distrubuted by Creative Micro Designs,
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